


Indelible

by surgicalfocus



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Australia, M/M, Memory Loss, Mild Sexual Content, Minor Character Death, Romance, brief mention of attempted suicide, eternal sunshine au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-23
Updated: 2019-02-01
Packaged: 2019-08-28 03:19:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 81,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16715648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/surgicalfocus/pseuds/surgicalfocus
Summary: While doing the rounds in his dad’s ice cream van, Chanyeol meets a beautiful boy sitting out in the street. His head has no idea who Baekhyun is, but maybe his heart does.





	1. Electric Blue

**Author's Note:**

> Hey hey,
> 
> This isn’t technically a new fic, but a rewritten version of a story I began writing last year called ‘Hello, Hello, Hello’, loosely based on the film ‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’. The title began to bother me after a while, so I changed it to make it less of a mouthful. If you were a reader of the old fic, much of the first half of the story might feel pretty similar to you — because it is lol. I’ve only rewritten a few details of the plot to make it work better with the way the fic ends. Otherwise a lot of it is the same, just a bit more fleshed out in parts. As before, the story’s setting is a seaside city called Wollongong, which is about an hour’s drive south of Sydney. All places, landmarks, etc. mentioned are real.
> 
> At the moment, my plan is to update on weekends like I used to do — I try to do this weekly but some chapters take longer to edit because of their length, and therefore some postings may be delayed. If you’d prefer to wait until all chapters are up to read it then that’s cool.
> 
> Okay I guess that’s all. Hope you enjoy xx

 

______________________________

 

 _June 25_ _th_

_Whenever you smile at me, I feel like I can do anything. The effect may not be permanent, but it's a start._

 

______________________________

 

 

“You’ve got to be bloody joking,” Chanyeol said, the first time he saw it parked on the street outside his parents’ house.

The pink ice cream van his dad had bought for himself as a 60th birthday present was many things, but it wasn’t a joke. As it turned out, his clever plan for Chanyeol to drive it around for him on Sundays wasn’t a joke, either.

“It’s a bit of money on the side, and it’ll get you out of the house,” Mr. Park had said at the time. “All you do is go to work during the week and then spend your weekends holed up inside your apartment; your mother and I thought this would be a good way for you to get out there and talk to people, and you can make some extra cash while you’re at it. How is that a bad thing?”

After a bit of wheedling on his father’s part, Chanyeol had reluctantly agreed to the idea, although he didn’t know why. It was bad enough that his parents thought he was in what they called ‘a bit of a rut’, and that he had been for some time. Maybe he just wanted to prove them wrong.

“Fine,” he said to his father, “I’ll do it. But just so you know, if this is some sort of mid-life crisis thing, you’re at least ten years too late.”

  
Mr. Park had already been driving the van around for several weeks at that time, and so he accompanied Chanyeol on his first few rounds, preparing him for all the practical aspects of the job. He hadn’t prepared Chanyeol for all the weirdos an ice cream van could attract, though — that was something he had to learn to deal with on his own. The kids were usually fine, it was the adults who were the problem: the ones who asked him constantly if the soft-serve was made of pig fat (no, a complete myth) or if it had dairy in it (yes, obviously), if he had ‘anything else’ accompanied by air quotes —  possibly a reference to drugs, Chanyeol could never be sure. One morning while he was parked outside the North Wollongong surf club, a dodgy-looking guy gave him what he probably thought was a knowing look, and then he sidled up to the window with his hands shoved deep inside his trackie pockets and said, “I’m after something a bit more, you know… _green_ , if you get my drift.”

“I sell ice cream, not weed,” Chanyeol replied flatly. “I mean, the pistachio flavour’s about as green as it gets in here… I also have mint. But if you see another driver called Jongdae — drives a yellow van, kinda has a face like a cat — then I’m pretty sure he can hook you up. Ask him if he has any 'sherbet'.”

Chanyeol didn’t know if this was actually true; but Jongdae was a pain in the arse, so he didn’t really care.

  
  
He left North Beach not long after that, since the weather was grey and business was suitably dismal, and ended up bumping into Jongdae on his way. Chanyeol heard him coming long before he saw him; it was bad enough having to listen to his own Greensleeves chime all day, but it was even worse hearing two of them playing at the same time. As he approached the other van, he rolled down his window and put on his best fake smile. “Hey, Jongdae. How’s it going?”

“Not too bad, Pinky. Yourself?” Chanyeol was already painfully aware that his dad’s van was pink, a fact that he was reminded of constantly. But now that his hair was dyed pink as well — not by choice — it meant that Jongdae had twice the ammo to work with. Today he actually seemed in a good mood; his cat-like smile was pleasant, but Chanyeol knew there was probably some murderous intent buried in there somewhere, and not all that deeply. “What brings you to my route on this fine day?”

“It’s not ‘your route', Jongdae — it’s a free country,” Chanyeol said, cool but civil. “Anyway, slim pickings around North Beach today… just a tip if you’re heading that way. I just squeezed what I could out of whoever was there.”

“Yeah? Probably because I was already there earlier,” Jongdae replied, and then he laughed heartily. “Sorry, bro — way ahead of you. Anyway, have a good one. Keep dreaming big.” He took off down the road before Chanyeol had a chance to reply.

“Fucking Jongdae,” Chanyeol muttered under his breath. There were definitely times when he enjoyed being an ice cream man; it was actually quite comfortable in the van, except when he needed to stop and find a place to take a piss. The kids were always cute. He gave big scoops to the ones who said please and thank you, and slightly smaller scoops to the ones who made fun of his pink hair, or his ‘sticky-outy’ ears. He could play whatever music he liked as long as it didn’t interfere with the chime, and if the soft-serve machine was noisy as hell, then he’d learned to live with it. But he wouldn’t be quitting his day job anytime soon.

Even if Jongdae had stolen much of the business beforehand, there hadn’t been a lot of people out and about that day anyway. It was still only early September, it wasn’t a sunny day, and the wind-chill factor had clearly kept the crowds indoors. Chanyeol knew these were the quieter months, though; before too long, summer would hit them all like a warm, wet slap in the face, and business would pick up along with it. The problem was that he still hadn’t planned out a proper route yet, a route of his own, one that would keep him from encroaching on Jongdae’s supposed ‘turf’; he usually started at North Beach first, and finished up somewhere near the beach at Port Kembla, since it was close to where his parents lived and he could drop the van back off to them before going home. But the Gong was a small world, or small enough, and they were always bound to run into each other eventually.

 

That afternoon, he drove through Wentworth Street on his way back, like he always did. The shutters were pulled across all the shop windows, the garage doors rolled down, the cafes and bakeries all locked up. If he happened to pass through during the week, he would sometimes stop at the burek shop, run by a nice Macedonian family whose eldest son he’d gone to high school with, to say hello and grab a snack; but today they were closed too. There was an old man draped over a bench outside the Port Kembla Hotel, one of the three pubs on Wentworth — or maybe there were four now, Chanyeol could never keep up — no doubt pissed out of his mind, probably with nowhere else to be. A couple of cars parked along the kerb, but no one walking around; no sound whatsoever except for the chime of Chanyeol’s van, the eerie silence making an already-creepy tune sound slightly creepier. There was something about driving down that street on a Sunday afternoon that made Chanyeol feel like the last person left on earth. No one ever seemed to hang around longer than they had to; apart from the three pubs and a convenience store, only one kebab joint looked like it was open.

But he still always returned to that same stretch of road, like he’d find the answer to something if he did. Chanyeol didn’t even know what the question was; all he knew was that the ache would roll in steadily like the tide each time he drove through, a pang of nostalgia or sadness, or some other emotion he couldn’t quite name — like he’d lost something or someone, somewhere around there, at some point in time, but couldn’t remember what or whom. That was all it was, a rising wave of a feeling, and it would ebb away as soon as he turned off into Darcy or Jubilee, or one of the other streets nearby. There was an old notebook in the bottom drawer of his desk at home, with an entry in it that read _‘43 Wentworth St. P.K., 11 am’_ , written in what appeared to be his own hand, which he couldn’t recall ever writing. Why he’d written it, or why all but a few of the notebook’s pages had been torn out, that he didn’t know either. On one of the other remaining pages, a sketch of a pair of eyes — closed, as though asleep. The rest of the pages were blank.

Now 43 Wentworth was just an abandoned shopfront with a ‘for lease’ sign that had languished in the front window for months, its colours slowly fading from the sun. Next door there was a vacant lot overgrown with flowering weeds: graffiti scrawled over the walls on one side of it, and a large mural of a girl’s face on the other. She had eyes that followed you everywhere and a secret smile, beguiling but tight-lipped; and Chanyeol kept driving past her like one day she’d open her mouth and let those secrets tumble out of it, maybe even tell him why he kept coming back here, but she never did.

 

Today, though, there was a boy sitting on the footpath out the front of number 43, next to the door, leaning against the wall with his arms wrapped around his bent knees. He wore a black hoodie and had a face like the world was ending, like he might have been crying not too long ago. As soon as Chanyeol saw him, he quickly pulled up out the front, parked the van and turned the chime off. Walking over to the service window, he called out, “hey, are you alright?”

The boy jerked his head up to stare at him, his eyes widening at the sound of Chanyeol’s voice. Now that Chanyeol could see him properly, he was less of a boy and more of a young man, and even with his face all red and puffy, he was cute. He rubbed his eyes and nodded. "Yeah," he said, and then as an afterthought, “well, I suppose I’ve been better.” He looked at Chanyeol like he was squinting at the sun, and then, unexpectedly, he smiled. It was a funny smile: big and rectangular and toothy, nothing subtle or secretive about it. If the boy was already cute before, then he was beautiful now.

“What’s wrong, if you don’t mind me asking,” Chanyeol said, and regretted it as soon as the boy’s smile began to fade. “Oh, I’m sorry… I shouldn’t be asking you that. You don't have to answer.”

The boy shook his head. “It’s fine, really. I’m just having a bit of a shit day. But thanks for checking up on me.”

“No worries. Just doing my neighbourly duty.” Chanyeol had an idea then, patting the sill of the window. “You want some ice cream? Anything you like, my shout.”

The boy blinked at him for a moment before smiling again. “Well, if you’re gonna twist my arm... I wouldn’t say no to a Gaytime.”

“Are we talking about the kind that comes on a stick, or something else?” Holding back a grin, Chanyeol turned away for a moment to slide open the freezer. It was obvious that the guy was flirting now, and why not play along for a bit? He was a babe, and Chanyeol couldn’t remember the last time any babes had bothered to flirt with him. “And yeah, of course I do. They’re a personal favourite, incidentally.” Turning around again, he tossed the ice cream to the boy, who looked surprised at first, his lips forming a little ‘O’ shape, but then he managed to catch it in both hands at the last second.

Chanyeol whistled and gave him a round of applause. “Good catch.”

The boy laughed and unwrapped the Gaytime, taking a big bite out of it. "Here for a Gaytime, not for a long time,” he replied, around a mouthful of caramel ice cream and cookie crumbs. “Nice hair, by the way. Anyone ever tell you that you look like a rainbow Paddlepop?”

Chanyeol reached up to touch his hair with an absent little smile. “Pretty much every time someone asks me for one, yeah.”

“It’s so cool. Did you dye it yourself?”

Chanyeol shook his head. “My cousin’s a trainee hairdresser, so I let her experiment on me sometimes.” He’d been meaning to dye over the fluffy nest of pinkish-purple unicorn puke sprouting from his head, but maybe he’d keep it that way for a bit longer.

“You know what? I might dye mine blue... I've always wanted to do that,” the boy said, thinking aloud. “You’ve just inspired me, handsome stranger.” He raised his partially-eaten ice cream at Chanyeol, as if toasting him. “Thanks for this, by the way. It’s really nice of you. If I knew it’d get me free ice cream from cute rainbow-haired guys, I’d sit out in the street and look depressed more often.” There it was again, that smile, slowly reappearing like the sun coming out after a cloudy morning. It really was a killer smile, Chanyeol thought; the kind that would probably be stuck in his head for ages, worse than a bad song you pretend to hate but secretly love.

"That's okay. Any time.” Chanyeol thought about asking for the guy’s number, but it didn’t really feel right; not when it looked like he’d possibly been crying only a few minutes before. He could ask for his name, though. “I’m Chanyeol, by the way. And you?”

Now the boy had a cookie crumb stuck to his upper lip. He smiled as he licked it away, and Chanyeol had never wanted to kiss someone so badly in his life. “I’m Baekhyun,” he said, still smiling. “Very nice to meet you.”

“Likewise.” Chanyeol grinned back at him. “Anyway, I’d better get going. But I hope your day gets better.”

 “Thanks. Maybe I’ll see you around.” And normally Chanyeol would have dismissed this parting remark as nothing but a simple pleasantry, but when he saw the boy waving him off in the rearview mirror, a big part of him believed it. It left him so lightheaded that he barely noticed the sun had come out again during the drive home.

 

 

______________________________

 

_January 4th_

_You’re impulsive; you always have been. You’re always saying “let’s go” — let’s go here, let’s go there. I’ve seen more of my city in the past six months than I have in the past twenty-six years. You’re always showing me something different — new ways to see the place I live in. Sometimes you ask me if I think you’re nuts… if I think you’re too loud, too brash — too much. I don’t know how many times I’ll have to tell you no, that this is what I love about you, before you’ll start to believe me. Your love and your laughter and your lust for life are just too big for your body to contain them, that’s all. There’s nothing wrong with that._

_Because I love seeing things through your eyes, and that’s the truth. The beautiful world, through your beautiful eyes. My beautiful boy._

_Sometimes I wonder how I’ll ever live without you now. How do you go back to black and white, after seeing in colour for the first time?_

 

______________________________

 

 

Whether he was fully conscious of it or not, the beautiful but sad-looking boy he met while driving down Wentworth Street lingered somewhere in the back of Chanyeol's mind over the week that followed. Then he found that he couldn't sleep again, although this was nothing new. Baekhyun wasn’t to blame for the insomnia, but his presence in Chanyeol's thoughts somehow made him even more restless than usual. By the end of the week it had all caught up with him, and he dragged himself to work on Friday with noticeable bags under his eyes, his unruly mop of pink hair looking like it wanted to crawl away from his scalp.

His manager called him into her office for one of her 'chats' shortly after lunch. “Is everything alright?” she asked, looking up at Chanyeol as he walked into the room. "You look terrible. I know we all get hit with the old three-thirtyitis occasionally, but it's not supposed to set in before one." She seemed genuinely concerned, but whether that concern was for Chanyeol’s wellbeing or for his suffering productivity, he couldn't tell.

Chanyeol closed the door behind him and flopped down on the chair opposite Chaerin's desk. “I’m okay. I just haven’t slept very well over the past few days.”

Chaerin narrowed her eyes at him through her Chanel glasses. Chanyeol knew she did this out of habit whenever she was focusing on something, and not because she was glaring, or suspicious. It had been a little intimidating the first time she’d aimed that look at him, but he was used to it now. “Why not?” she asked.

Chanyeol answered in the form of a simple shrug. How would he even be able to explain it? The insomnia had been visiting him on-and-off for a couple of years, and a particularly bad bout of it was always preceded by a spell of unpleasant dreams — usually replays of the same disturbing vision. In the dream, he would see a figure or a shadow of a person — blurred, unrecognisable — leaning against the iron railing on a bridge or something similar, standing with their feet wedged between the horizontal bars. All the peripheral details were lost to him, but the one thing that remained clear in his mind was those feet in their dirty white sneakers. The figure would stand on their toes, and then they would lean too far forward over the railing, and Chanyeol would shout at them to be careful until his throat felt like it might bleed. He always woke up suddenly, his heart pounding so hard it made him feel sick. Sometimes he felt like he was the one who was falling forward, but then a warm sensation — much like a pair of arms wrapping themselves around his waist — would hold him back. After one of these dreams, getting back to sleep again would be nearly impossible.

“Yeol, are you listening to me?” Chaerin said, snapping him out of it.

“Huh?” Chanyeol mumbled, "oh… yeah.”

He expected Chaerin to get all stony-faced at him, as she sometimes did when he wasn’t paying attention to her, but instead her expression softened. “I’m gonna do the humane thing and send you home early to get some rest," she said. "I know the bakery down the road winning local business of the year for the third time running isn’t exactly riveting stuff to write about... but you’re not really much use to me in the state you're in." Holding the end of her blonde ponytail in one hand, she began to wind it around in a bun using the reflection in her monitor as a mirror, before pinning it up at the top of her head. "Anyway, I saw you nodding off at your desk earlier. You’ll only end up putting your face right through your computer screen if I leave you there like that.”

Chanyeol offered her a half-hearted smile. “Are you saying all of this because you actually care about me, or am I just a liability?”

“Bit of both." Chaerin smiled back at him, and then waved in the general direction of her office door. “That’s all I wanted to talk to you about… now off you go. Have a good weekend, and make sure you actually get some sleep this time. I want to see you looking well-rested on Monday morning. That can be your special weekend assignment."

“But I still have so much to dooooo,” Chanyeol said, drawing his voice out in a long whine, but Chaerin only held up one crimson-nailed hand to stop him short.

“Please, just do whatever’s really pressing and then go home,” she said. “You work for local government, hon — you're allowed to fart-arse around once in a while. Isn't that what everyone outside this building thinks we do anyway?"

Chanyeol groaned, but she had a point, and he wasn't in the mood to argue. Whatever wasn’t urgent would just have to wait until Monday.

 

Before he went home, he walked over to the motorbike shop across the road to say hi to Minseok. Chanyeol often dropped in to visit his best friend during his lunch break, but he'd been too busy lately to do so. Minseok was there when he entered, polishing one of the demo models with a rag. “Hey,” he said, looking up when Chanyeol walked into the showroom, and raised both eyebrows at the sight of him. “Wow, nice 'do. Another one of Wendy’s creations?"

"Yeah, she went a bit nuts this time. Not that she hasn't all the other times.” Chanyeol’s hair had since faded to the colour of fairy floss, but he still had yet to do anything about it. He had other things to worry about now, like whether he was going to sleep ever again.

“You should tell her to give you a break or your hair's gonna start falling out.” Minseok frowned, studying Chanyeol’s face with his head tilted to one side. “Are you okay? You don’t look very good.”

“Yeah," Chanyeol sighed, "I know. I just haven't had much sleep, so my boss let me off early." He absently ran his fingers along the chrome detailing on a Yamaha cruiser, moving his hand away when he earned a flick on the arse from Minseok's dust rag. "Oops... sorry. Anyway, I just thought I'd come past and say hi before I go home. I feel like I haven't seen you guys in ages. How's Sehun?”

“He’s alright — same old. Up to his eyeballs in bike parts, as usual. But it’s been a bit quiet up here in the showroom today." Minseok leaned over to polish some fingerprints off the side mirror of a fluorescent green Ninja 300. “You wanna come over tonight? We’re doing Fried Chicken Friday."

Chanyeol shook his head. ”Thanks, but no thanks… reckon I'll just get some takeaway and go to bed early. Or try to, at least."

“Fair enough. Well, the offer’s always there if you change your mind. You can come by anytime you want, you know; we’re always happy to see you.” Minseok tossed the rag into a bucket on the floor and wiped his hands on his jeans. “Hey, you should try that new noodle joint in Fairy Meadow — ‘Noodle Palace’, it’s called. The food's great, and it's free delivery within five K’s. Sehun and I go there all the time now.”

“Yeah? Sounds good, actually. Thanks for the tip,” Chanyeol said. “I probably would’ve just hit up Cholesterol Corner, otherwise." Cholesterol Corner had a KFC, a Subway, a Hungry Jack’s, a Red Rooster, an Outback Steakhouse, a McDonald’s and a Pizza Hut all in a row, and resisting any one of them was pointless if it meant you would only bend to the charms of the next one along. He looked up to see a couple of potential customers walk through the automatic glass doors, and figured that was his cue to get going. "Anyway, I'll leave you to it. Tell Sehun I said hi, I don’t wanna disturb him if he’s busy.”

“Sure thing. By the way, you didn’t hear this from me… but since Hunnie’s out of earshot, I guess I can say it.” Minseok leaned forward with one hand held up to the side of his mouth, lowering his voice a little. “One of the delivery guys at Noodle Palace is a fuckin babe, man — a hundred out of ten, would smash if I was single. Just thought I’d let you know, in case you’re interested. He seems like he’d be your type.” Minseok winked at Chanyeol and waved him off, then walked over to greet the two young men checking out the trail bikes. Chanyeol rolled his eyes at this piece of information, but he couldn’t help smiling to himself anyway.

 

He collapsed on the sofa as soon as he arrived back at his apartment, and thought that maybe he could try to get some sleep now that he was home, while it was still light out. He found it easier to fall asleep in short bursts during the day; at night-time was when the dreams came, and with those dreams came thoughts of The Accident. He didn’t know if The Accident was even related to the dreams, since he couldn’t actually remember what The Accident itself had involved. He couldn’t remember a lot of things.

It seemed so strange to Chanyeol — being left with almost no memory of a whole chunk of his life, and having to rely on the words of other people to fill in the blank spaces. There were things he knew, and things he didn’t know. He knew he’d had a boyfriend, who had tragically died some years ago; this was what ‘The Accident’ referred to. The death had broken him to pieces at the time, but now he could see only tiny glimpses of it in his mind’s eye, and whatever vision he had left was so spotted that he couldn’t make any sense of it. He couldn’t recall where The Accident had occurred, or how; he only knew that it must have been something truly awful, because no one wanted to talk to him about it. Whenever he dwelled on it too much, he would start to feel sick, and sad, and also frightened, but these were the only vague emotional ties he had left. Everything else had deteriorated. And though a part of him still wanted to put these fragments together — to find out what had really happened that day — he also couldn’t help agreeing with his mother’s words to him, the same phrase she trotted out whenever he’d tried to talk to her about it in the past: that perhaps it was a blessing not to remember.

Eventually Chanyeol passed out in front of the television, still wearing his work clothes; he woke up again a little after six, groggy with sleep, and with a thread of drool running down one side of his chin. Wiping it away with the back of his hand, he grabbed his phone, looked up the number for Noodle Palace and called them to order one serving of chicken Pad Thai. While waiting for the food to arrive, he thought about what it would be like if someone actually built a palace out of noodles, and how structurally unsound that would be. He was on the verge of falling asleep again when he heard a crashing sound coming from somewhere out in the street. Rubbing his eyes, he stumbled over to the balcony to investigate.

When he got outside, he saw that someone — presumably the Noodle Palace delivery boy — had accidentally driven their red scooter up onto the pavement out the front of the building, knocking over a row of wheelie bins. He wore a glossy black helmet with the visor pulled down, and Chanyeol couldn’t see his face. The guy got to his feet and stood there pooled in light from the street lamp, inspecting the carnage: the scooter lying on its side, and the bins with their innards spilling all over the concrete. He took off the helmet and began tugging despairingly at his electric-blue hair, cursing so loudly and colourfully that Chanyeol could hear every single ‘shit’ and ‘fuck’ from his first floor balcony.

 _His hair is blue,_ Chanyeol thought. His heart began to pound at the sight, and he didn’t know why. He still couldn't clearly see the guy's face — he was too busy looking down at the mess and swearing his bloody head off — but there was definitely a chance it was _him_. A teeny, tiny, infinitesimally minute chance.

“Hey,” he yelled, “are you alright down there?”

The delivery boy looked up with a panicked expression, searching for the source of Chanyeol’s voice. “I’m really sorry about this mess, sir. I’ll clean it up right away.” Grunting with the effort, he lifted the scooter back up until it stood upright. His eyes widened when they finally landed on Chanyeol standing out on the balcony. “Oh!” he said, “you're—”

“Baekhyun! Is that you?” Although a part of him had already known, the feeling of joyful surprise inside Chanyeol's chest blossomed so suddenly that he burst out laughing before he could stop himself.

Baekhyun's look of horror slowly morphed into a grin. When he smiled, his eyes did too, reshaping themselves into happy little crescents. "Yeah, it’s me.” He pointed at Chanyeol and clicked his fingers a couple of times, as though trying to summon a memory. “Chanyeol, right?"

Chanyeol laughed again. “Right. Or you can keep calling me ‘sir’ if you want. I don't mind either way."

"Ha ha," Baekhyun said flatly. With one hand, he began to smooth his blue hair down where he'd messed it up. "Look at this fucking disaster... again, I’m so sorry."

"Don't worry about it." Chanyeol wanted to get closer, to lean against the railing, but he couldn't. He couldn't even go near it — railings freaked him out for some reason. "You know, I was wondering when I’d next have the pleasure of bumping into you. But I didn’t think it would happen this quickly. Or this noisily.”

“Well, I just thought I'd make an unforgettable entrance, as you do.” Baekhyun was still smiling, if a little sheepishly.

“Oh, I won’t be forgetting it in a hurry,” Chanyeol said. “I see you went ahead with the blue hair. It really suits you."

"You think so? I did it myself out of a box. I was kinda hoping we'd meet again too, so I could show you how good the colour turned out... funny how the universe works." Baekhyun opened the top-box fitted to the back of his scooter, pulling out a white plastic bag from inside it. “Anyway, I’ve got your order here, and it looks like it hasn’t spilled out of the container. The noodle gods must be smiling upon you."

“Great. I’m in unit number six if you want to come on up. And don’t worry about the bins, I’ll go down and sort it out later.”

 

In the minute or so that he had available to him while Baekhyun ascended the stairs, Chanyeol hurried around his living room, tidying up as much as he could. When he was done he stood next to the front door, listening to the sound of Baekhyun's footsteps coming down the corridor. He still jumped a little when he heard the knock, and waited a couple of seconds before opening the door.

Nothing could have adequately prepared him for seeing Baekhyun standing right there on his front doorstep. It was the first time Chanyeol had been that close to him — close enough to notice that he had a handful of tiny moles on his face, one on his cheek, another above his lips and one more on his chin, all in a straight line. He looked sexy in his tight black jeans and leather riding jacket. He smiled — small, closed-mouthed and non-rectangular, but still beautiful — and handed Chanyeol the plastic bag.

“Thanking you." Chanyeol took the bag and held it open, peering inside it. The food smelled mouthwateringly good, but something was amiss. “Um, not to nitpick or anything, but I only ordered one chicken Pad Thai. There are two containers in here.”

Baekhyun’s smile gradually faded. “Oh… right. Whoopsy.”

Chanyeol put the bag down on the floor and pulled out his wallet. “It’s okay, I’ll pay you for both. It's not a big deal."

“No way. I can’t make you pay for something you didn’t even order,” Baekhyun said, shaking his head. “Don’t worry about it. We'll just call it 'buy one, get one free'."

Chanyeol paused for a moment, and then he said, "I might have an idea, if you’re interested. Completely up to you, of course.”

"What's that?" Baekhyun asked, blinking at him curiously.

Chanyeol scratched the back of his neck, thinking about how to phrase his proposal. “Well… do you wanna come in and eat with me?” Baekhyun only gave him a blank look, and so of course he kept on babbling like an idiot. “I mean, I’m guessing you maybe haven’t eaten dinner yet, and I don't know what I'm gonna do with all this food..."

“You can always keep the other one for lunch tomorrow,” Baekhyun said with a shrug.

"I'm trying to shamelessly hit on you right now," Chanyeol replied, laughing softly, “and there you are being all practical."

Baekhyun let out a nervous chuckle of his own. "Sorry… it’s just been a while since anyone's done that. Hit on me, I mean.” He continued to stand there, rocking back and forth on the heels of his boots, looking shy. The shyness seemed a little out of place on him, but Chanyeol thought it was sweet. “I don’t have any other orders to deliver right this minute, so I suppose I could come in for a bit," he said at last. "Just for ten minutes, maybe."

 

In the end Chanyeol got more than his money's worth, for ten minutes quickly became fifteen, and then twenty. While he ate, he looked at Baekhyun sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the coffee table opposite him, happily slurping up his noodles. He looked comfortable, like he'd been doing exactly that in the very same spot for years. He was also a noisy eater and chewed with his mouth open; but rather than being irritating, Chanyeol found it endearing, and Baekhyun looked so content to be there that his heart couldn't have been more full at the sight.

And yet.

"Not that I wanna kick you out, or anything,” he said, breaking the comfortable silence, "but won't people start wondering where you are if you don't go back soon?"

Baekhyun didn’t look the least bit bothered. “I’ll just say I was caught in traffic or something. I doubt they’ll crucify me if I'm a teeny bit late.”

“Okay. I'd just hate to get you in trouble, that's all.” Chanyeol went back to mucking around with his food, pushing all the spring onions to one side of the container. “This might sound like a weird question, by the way… but have we met somewhere before?”

“Yeah,” Baekhyun said, “you threw a Gaytime at me in the street, remember?”

“I know." Chanyeol tried his hardest to hold in an exasperated little puff of air, but some of it escaped anyway. "But I meant before that."

“Oh. Maybe..?” Baekhyun shrugged. “Who knows?"

"Who knows," Chanyeol echoed, because he didn't know how else to respond. He could already tell he was starting to like Baekhyun, although maybe it was just that he hadn't had any attention from someone cute in a while, and it made him feel a bit giddy.

“So… Chanyeol.” Baekhyun shovelled in some more noodles, talking with his mouth full. "Have you always been an ice cream man? Like, is that your job?”

Chanyeol shook his head. “It’s not my day job. I’m an online communications officer for Wollongong city council. Which maybe sounds important, but in reality I just spend most of my time managing and writing content for their website — boring drivel, mostly.” He picked up a piece of chicken and chewed on it thoughtfully. "The van actually belongs to my dad. He retired recently and didn’t really know what to do with himself, so he purchased it on a whim. I just drive it around for him sometimes on weekends, when I have nothing better to do.”

“Sounds a lot more fun than being a delivery boy.” Baekhyun licked his lips after another bite. The sight made Chanyeol’s mouth go dry.

“Driving the van is alright, I guess,” he said. “It gets me out of the house, anyway."

Baekhyun glanced at Chanyeol’s empty container. “You don’t like spring onions, huh.” The way he said it, it was more of a statement than a question.

Chanyeol followed his gaze, looking down at the little pile of spring onions he’d made. “What? Oh… no, not really. They give me heartburn.” He looked at Baekhyun again, and held the container slightly towards him. “Do you…?”

Baekhyun didn’t wait for him to finish the question. He just shrugged and leaned over to pick up the little pile of onions with his chopsticks, smiling at Chanyeol and holding his gaze as he put them in his mouth. Chanyeol smiled back at him, but then he felt shy and had to look down at his feet. How strangely familiar it was, that gesture — familiar and intimate. It could only have been more intimate if he’d taken the onions with his own chopsticks, and fed them to Baekhyun himself.

Their little moment was interrupted by the sound of Baekhyun’s phone ringing. He pulled it out of his pocket, his eyebrows shooting up when he saw the caller ID, and he shoved it back in again without answering. “That’s the Palace calling me. Probably wondering where the hell I am.” He quickly swiped a napkin over his lips. “This has been great and all, but I gotta jet.”

 

They left the apartment, and Chanyeol walked Baekhyun over to where he’d parked his scooter. "Thanks for that," Baekhyun said, turning around to smile at him. “It was really nice of you. In fact, you've been way too nice to me in the very short time I’ve known you. I’ll have to return the favour sometime." 

“Not at all… it was my pleasure. Thank you for keeping me company." Chanyeol smiled back at Baekhyun, and then his gaze drifted over to the red scooter, and finally to the license plate, which read ‘2SXY4U’. His lips twitched a little at the corners. “Does your license plate say what I think it says?"

Baekhyun pouted at him. "Don't laugh at Buzz. He’s been through enough trauma for one evening.”

"Who the hell’s Buzz?” Chanyeol asked, frowning.

“My scooter.” Baekhyun said it like it was supposed to be obvious. "Anyway, I was 21 when I got that license plate. Not the best age for making responsible decisions.”

Chanyeol could feel another smile coming on, but he fought it off as best he could. "And how old are you now?”

Baekhyun looked sheepish again for a moment, letting out a nervous little laugh. “Um, 24..?"

"Okay." Chanyeol suddenly felt the need to bite down hard on his bottom lip, trying to hold a fresh chuckle in. "I'll let you get back to work, then. It was very nice running into you, though. I hope it happens again soon." 

He was about to walk back up to his apartment when Baekhyun called out to him, making him stop mid-stride. "There’s actually a story behind the license plate,” he said. “Seriously. I’m not as tragic as I look.”

"Really? Do tell," Chanyeol said, turning around to face him again.

Baekhyun started fiddling with the zipper on his leather jacket. “Okay. So back when I first got Buzz, the guy in the store who convinced me to buy him was flirting with me really hard, and he said that I should get a custom license plate with ‘too sexy for you’ on it — so I did. Not really because he told me to… it was more of a joke than anything else. I mean, it’s not like I actually believe it, or anything." He laughed nervously again before trailing off into silence.

“Well, maybe you should believe it,” Chanyeol said. “Maybe that guy was on to something."

Baekhyun just stared at him for a second or two before laughing again. "Yeah? I dunno about that.”

“It's a cute story, though.” Now Chanyeol was curious, but he wasn't sure whether to ask. “If you don't mind me asking, did anything come of it?”

Baekhyun looked at the ground for a moment, rubbing the end of his nose. “Nah," he said quietly. "Well, not really." He unlocked the top-box to pull out his helmet, and Chanyeol saw something yellow stuck to the side of it — a sunflower decal.

“You like sunflowers, too..?” he murmured absently, before he could stop himself.

"Sorry?” Baekhyun asked, looking at him with raised eyebrows.

“Nothing,” Chanyeol said, shaking his head. “So... will you come crashing into my life again sometime soon?”

Baekhyun smiled at him. “Well, Chanyeol, I guess that all depends on how much you like noodles.” He hopped on the back of Buzz and started up the engine, shooting Chanyeol one last grin before pulling the visor of his helmet down.

“I think I know what I'll be ordering tomorrow night!” Chanyeol yelled after him. He smiled to himself when Baekhyun lifted one arm in acknowledgement as he rode away. He was in such a good mood that he didn't even mind having to clean up the mess Baekhyun had made, and the little bit of bin juice he got on the front of his pants was worth it.

 

Later that night, after Chanyeol got out of the shower, he stood in front of the bathroom mirror and looked at the large sunflower tattooed over his heart, its petals spreading out across his chest. There hadn't been a real reason for him to get it; no inspirational meaning or cool story that he could tell anyone who asked. He just really liked sunflowers. He was glad he'd chosen a place that was covered most of the time, so he didn't have to explain this constantly. “It's so the love of my life will know where he can lay his head,” he'd sometimes jokingly tell himself, but he hadn't loved anyone like that since... or yet? Which of those was the right word? The pain was the one thing he remembered, mostly: those searing hot needles piercing his skin, stamping the ink into his flesh. It had been the worst right over the sternum, and at least several times he'd thought he was going to pass out. He traced the outlines of a petal with his finger, and then pulled a clean t-shirt over his head without bothering to dry off properly.

Instead of trying to sleep right away, he sat up in bed with his sketchbook on his lap, drawing as he often did — nothing in particular, just mindless doodling to wind himself down. The scratchy sound of pencil on paper was therapeutic, and his hand began to move of its own accord, until he saw a pair of eyes looking up at him from the page. Crescent-moon eyes with crinkles at the corners, and little stars twinkling within them, to watch over him while he slept. When he was done, he left the sketchbook open on the nightstand next to him and turned out the light.

 

______________________________

 

 _April 19_ _th_

_You call me your Sunflower because, in your own words, I am 'tall, pretty and happy'. You call me a lot of pet names. The hopeless romantic in me loves them all, but I think Sunflower's my favourite._

 

______________________________

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playlist for Chapter 1:
> 
> 1\. [Electric Blue - Icehouse](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgfR3AKCAQI) (some of the mullets in this video… lmao)  
> 2\. [Stay Wild - Little Birdy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hhCj5y_O9M)  
> 3\. [Déjà vu - Something for Kate](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l23p82aKsrc)  
> 4\. [My Happiness - Powderfinger](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Fj9DzE_OUA)  
> 5\. [Watch Over Me - Bernard Fanning](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnC5xJ1w_1w)


	2. Adventure

 

________________________________

 

_October 7th_

_Do you remember the first time you kissed me near the lighthouse? I remember thinking, while you stood there with my face (and my heart) cradled in your trembling hands, ‘here he is at last, the one who could ruin me for life’ — and I thought I’d be scared off by that feeling, but I wasn’t. You make me feel safer than I’ve ever felt._

_Anyway, some days I’ll break my own heart ten times before breakfast, but you still haven't done it even once._

 

________________________________

  
  
  
  
Chanyeol didn’t call up the Palace to order noodles again the next day; the intent was there, but the fear that he’d be coming on a bit too strong held him back. He thought waiting at least a few more days would be acceptable, but on Sunday morning he’d barely cracked an eye open when someone called him, the ringtone muffled from where his phone lay buried beneath his pillow. It was a number he didn’t recognise. Blinking the sleep out of his eyes, he picked it up, croaking out a dry-throated "hello?”. He had half a mind to blast whoever was calling for disturbing his hard-earned sleep on a weekend.

“Hey. It’s Baekhyun.” His voice sounded deeper on the phone. There was a short burst of husky, sexy laughter, and then he said, “I’m sorry, did I wake you?”

Chanyeol sat upright so quickly that his vision went spotty for a few seconds. “Baekhyun? How'd you get my number?”

“From when you called the Palace the other night. I hope you don’t mind me calling you.”

“No, not at all.” Chanyeol leaned back with his head against the wall, clutching at his chest with his free hand. It was too early for his heart to be beating this hard. “I was just wondering.”

“Alright. Sorry if I freaked you out.” There was still a hint of mirth in Baekhyun’s voice. “I just wanted to see what you were getting up to today. You know, in case you wanted to hang out or something.”

At first Chanyeol wasn’t sure he heard correctly. _Well_ , he thought, _since I’m clearly dreaming right now, I might as well go along with the script._ “Actually, I was gonna take the van out for a spin, like I do every Sunday,” he said, and then he paused. “Would you maybe like to join me?”

Without hesitation, Baekhyun replied, “sure, that’d be great.”

“Really..?” Chanyeol had a hard time hiding his surprise. “You won’t get bored?”

“Nah, I reckon it’ll be fun,” Baekhyun said. “Let's go drum up some business, and then maybe we can hit the beach afterwards. It’s supposed to be pretty warm today. High twenties, at least.”

“Okay. Sweet.” Chanyeol did a little dance of joy while still sitting up in his bed, which he prayed Baekhyun wouldn’t hear through the phone. “I have to go pick up the van from my mum and dad’s, and then I’ll come and get you. Where do you live again?”

“I’m only a couple of streets away from you. Hang on, I’ll text you the address.”

 

When Chanyeol pulled up across the road from Baekhyun’s place a little later, he was already standing out in the street waiting, wearing board shorts and a tight white t-shirt. He had a blue gym bag slung over his shoulder that was almost the same colour as his hair, and his eyes were glued to his phone. Chanyeol turned on the chime to get his attention, and Baekhyun looked up, smiling when he saw the pink van. He quickly glanced in both directions before hurrying across the street.

Chanyeol grinned at him through the open window. “Hop in,” he said, patting the seat next to him. Walking around to the passenger side, Baekhyun climbed in and pulled the door shut.

"You look all ready for the beach," Chanyeol said. His own beach clothes were still in a bag in the back of the van. “I’ll have to change when we get there.”

“Yeah, I thought I’d get my guns out for the boys today. Or 'the boy', in this case,” Baekhyun replied, winking at him. He made himself comfortable on the bench seat next to Chanyeol and looked around. “Cool. I’ve never been inside one of these before.”

“It's fun at first, but the novelty wears off after a while. So — where to?" Chanyeol turned out of Baekhyun’s street and back onto the main road, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. “My usual route is to start at North Beach and finish up at Port Kembla, but we could go somewhere else instead. If you're feeling adventurous."

Baekhyun tapped his chin, thinking over Chanyeol’s proposition. “North Beach, huh… how about somewhere a bit further south?”

“…South Beach?”

Baekhyun laughed. “Nah, I mean let’s get out of Wollongong altogether."

“And go where?” Chanyeol frowned, turning his head to look at Baekhyun for the split second that driving afforded him. “Seven Mile? Kiama?”

Baekhyun shook his head. "I was thinking down Jervis way. I grew up around there, I know every beach in the Shoalhaven like the back of my hand." When Chanyeol didn’t respond right away, he added, “I’ll take you to the best places. You’ll make a mint.”

Chanyeol was quiet for a moment longer. "Jervis Bay’s over an hour from here, easy." After a bit more thought, he said, “alright, let's do it."

Baekhyun just looked straight ahead and smiled to himself, like he knew Chanyeol was going to agree to his plan all along. “You know, any time you want company on one of your rounds, I’d happily join you,” he said. “I don't usually get up to much on Sundays, at least when I’m not working. Though I’d prefer it if you didn’t put that shitty music on.”

“Well, genius, if I don’t put the chime on, how the hell are people supposed to know I’m coming?” Chanyeol said. “Anyway, I won't turn it on again until we're there. Not much use blasting Greensleeves down the motorway.”

"Doesn’t this thing play any song that's not Greensleeves? I dunno, it just creeps me out a bit.”

“Nah, it only has the one song, sadly. Believe me, I'd change it if I could. How good would it be if I could get it to play ‘highway to hell’ instead?”

“I actually had a nightmare once where an ice cream van ran me over, and it was playing Greensleeves at the time.” Baekhyun leaned back against the seat, making himself more comfortable. "Anyway, it’s a stupid name. What does it even mean?”

“Well, according to legend, Lady Greensleeves found herself with a runny nose but no Kleenex, or whatever the medieval equivalent was. And so she did the job with her sleeves instead, thereby turning them green.”

Baekhyun laughed. “You’re sick,” he said, but in a playfully accusatory way, which made Chanyeol laugh along with him. The conversation between them was so easy and natural that he barely noticed the time it took to get there; he was really enjoying the spontaneous mini road-trip, and not only because he had an embarrassing crush on the guy sitting next to him. Only half an hour into the drive, the landscape had already changed dramatically: rolling green hills, paddocks stitched together with patches of bushland, the road winding gently through it all like a sleepy grey snake. Sunlight shone through the canopy of gumtree branches above them, dappling the asphalt with spots of shadow. 

 When they arrived at Nowra, Baekhyun said, "so this is home. What do you think?" Chanyeol had been to Nowra before — or through it, anyway. But now that he knew Baekhyun had grown up there, it made him pay more attention to the suburban sprawl that had suddenly replaced the verdant beauty of the countryside. To him it looked just like any other semi-rural town.

“Is this it..?” he said jokingly, and Baekhyun thanked him with a (surprisingly quite hard) punch on the shoulder; but he was grinning at the same time, so Chanyeol doubted he was actually offended.

“Relax, I’m only stirring." Chanyeol glanced over at Baekhyun. "Anyway, we’re in _your_ hood now, captain. So direct me."

“Alright. We'll check out Culburra first, then," Baekhyun said. “That’s always a popular beach, though sometimes the surf's a bit rough. After that we'll drive around into the bay. The bay’s beaches are a little more family-friendly.”

Chanyeol shrugged. “You’re the boss.” When he looked at Baekhyun again, he saw that he was smiling, so he smiled back.

 

The beach was a further twenty-minute drive away — twenty minutes of mostly cattle-grazing fields, which eventually gave way to a eucalypt forest, and then a little village emerged from the clearing at the end of it. Chanyeol knew they were getting close when he saw a group of young men with surfboards standing in the street, and turned the chime on to signal his arrival. He parked the van across the road when they got to the beach, and immediately several towel-swaddled children dragged their parents over, excited by the promise of ice cream. Chanyeol had to show Baekhyun how to use the soft-serve machine to make a good cone. “So you hold it like this, right… close to the nozzle. And then you fill the bottom first, and kinda just move it around like so. Follow the edge of the cone. And then put the lever back up really quickly at the end. Easy.”

Baekhyun had unusually pretty hands for a guy, but it turned out they weren’t very practiced at the art of making a soft-serve cone. After a few failed attempts, all of which had come out looking like little white turds, Baekhyun gave Chanyeol a pat on the back and said “I think I’ll leave this part to you.” He at least had the good humour to laugh at himself and his little ice cream poops, all of which Chanyeol thankfully managed to save. He ended up manning the soft-serve machine on his own, and had Baekhyun help out with serving at the window instead, since he was a lot better in that department. It turned out that he was especially good with the kids, and Chanyeol couldn’t help melting a little at how beautiful he looked whenever he smiled at them — leaning right over the counter to speak to them at their level, while accepting the coins from their little hands and praising their good manners. Chanyeol watched him from the corner of his eye while he busied himself filling cones with ice cream and dipping them in liquid chocolate and sprinkles. There was a warm feeling of fondness unfolding inside his chest, and a silly grin permanently stuck to his face; he could tell at one point that he’d been caught in his silent admiration, because the look in Baekhyun’s eyes when he saw him — and the smile he offered in return — said it all. Chanyeol felt too fluttery inside to be all that embarrassed about it.

 After they left the beach, Chanyeol parked the van across from the town centre and they stopped for lunch, demolishing burgers and hot chips with chicken salt, followed by a quick ciggie break. Baekhyun bummed one off Chanyeol even though he ‘didn't smoke anymore’, or so he said, and they stood next to each other by the side of the road, smoking in comfortable silence. There were three grey kangaroos standing in the empty field across from the abandoned service station.

"I hardly ever see kangaroos,” Chanyeol said absently, watching them graze. "Not living ones, anyway."

“Same.” Baekhyun stepped on his cigarette butt before kicking it onto the grass. “Let's go to Callala next; the water’s always flat as a tack there. Should be lots of kids around.”

“Whatever you say, boss." Smiling to himself, Chanyeol followed Baekhyun back to the van.

 

When they arrived at their next stop, there were a number of people milling around the entrance to the beach; some coming, others going, carrying bodyboards and beach bags, and wrapped up in towels of all colours. There were children everywhere, just as Baekhyun had predicted, and they sold so much ice cream there that Chanyeol was worried he would have to stop and refill the soft-serve machine — it would probably take at least half an hour to freeze to the right consistency. But in the end he got lucky, and the mix held out until the crowd began to thin.

"We're nearly out of Paddlepops in all flavours except banana," Baekhyun said, digging around in the freezer to check the stock after all the people lining up had been served. "Five vanilla Cornettos left… three chocolate. Seven Splices. Only two Gaytimes. Looks like the only thing we didn't sell a lot of was the Magnums."

"I can't believe how well we just did! I’ve never had a day this good back at home. I should bring you with me all the time.” Chanyeol couldn’t help smiling; Jongdae would be green with envy if he knew what a goldmine this place was. Not that he would ever drive out that far.

Baekhyun grinned back at him. "I told you, didn't I?" he said, kissing the fingers on his right hand. "I've got the Midas touch, baby.”

They each had a celebratory Gaytime inside the van, and then Chanyeol locked it up, and they headed down to the beach for a swim. "We've definitely earned it," Baekhyun said, and the temperature had climbed high enough for Chanyeol to agree with him.

When they got down to the sand, Baekhyun pulled his shirt off and dumped it along with his bag, then ran off ahead towards the clear turquoise-blue water. Chanyeol tagged along a way behind, trying not to trip over the wind-woven blades of spinifex sprouting from the dunes; the sand was bright white and hot beneath his feet, almost too hot to walk on, and it took a moment to adjust to the glare. There were no waves to speak of; it was less like the beaches Chanyeol was used to, and more of an enormous sandy swimming pool. He stood at the waterline for several minutes, trying to get used to the water temperature, watching Baekhyun enjoy himself from a safe distance.

"Hey, wuss," Baekhyun called out to him from where he was swimming. “Aren’t you coming in? It's not cold at all!" He swam closer to the shore and emerged from the water, wading towards Chanyeol with his shorts clinging to his thighs, his body wet and glistening. Chanyeol tried not to be too obvious about checking him out — the broad shoulders and the abs especially didn’t escape his attention — but it was hard.

"That's new," Baekhyun murmured, pointing at Chanyeol’s sunflower tattoo, which was partly obscured by his crossed arms.

Chanyeol unfolded his arms and looked down at his chest. “This? I’ve had it for a while now.”

“A bit up yourself, aren’t you… getting a self-portrait tattooed to your own chest,” Baekhyun said, smiling with one side of his mouth.

Chanyeol frowned. “What do you mean?"

“The sunflower is you.” Now Baekhyun’s half-smile was a full one. “Both of you are tall, pretty and happy."

"Oh… right.” The sweet words burned themselves into Chanyeol’s soul, and he couldn't keep the shy little grin off his face until Baekhyun bent down to splash water at him without warning, laughing when he let out an embarrassing shriek of surprise.

"What was that for?" Chanyeol whined; he stood there shivering with his arms around himself, huddled for warmth. “Now I’m cold, you little shit.”

“Aw, come on... you just gotta get right in there.” Baekhyun’s voice was gentler now, trying to coax him in. When the gentle approach didn’t work, he splashed Chanyeol again, this time completely drenching him in seawater.

Chanyeol spluttered, shaking the water from his hair in a spray of droplets. "Okay, that's it — now you're really gonna get it."

Baekhyun, who was now floating on his back, seemed unworried by Chanyeol's threats. "Oh yeah? Go on, then.” So Chanyeol pushed him under, holding him down for a couple of seconds. He grinned when Baekhyun burst up out of the water again, with a sharp inhale that quickly turned into laughter and war cries of _“you are so dead!”_

Chanyeol was about to push him down again when a pinching sensation on one of his toes stopped him short. “Hey, I think something just bit my toe.” He reached down to feel around near his feet, grabbing a handful of sand, and picked up several hard things with it that he assumed were rocks. When the water washed the sand away, he saw that they weren’t rocks at all, but a pile of tiny hermit crabs. "What the…”

“Oh, yeah. This beach is full of them,” Baekhyun said. “Little nippers. Did one get you?"

Chanyeol nodded. “Didn’t hurt, really. Just gave me a bit of a surprise.” He grabbed two more handfuls of sand, unearthing even more crabs. “Look how many there are!”

 

They each carried a pile of hermit crabs to the shore, gave them eccentric names and tried to race them. It didn’t really work out — they either stayed hidden inside their shells, or crawled off in any direction except towards the finish line that Baekhyun had drawn in the sand.

“Well, that was pointless,” Chanyeol said, shaking his head in mock disappointment. "I had so much faith in you, Joan Clawford! How could you let me down?"

Baekhyun just laughed. "Come on, let’s throw them back.” They stood side by side at the shoreline and threw the crabs back into the ocean, farewelling them individually by their given names — _goodbye, Pinchy_ , and _goodbye, Mr. Snippy_ , and _goodbye, Sebastian Junior_ and so on, until all of them were gone.

After returning the crabs to the water, they walked back to the sand to dry off in the sun. Baekhyun stood there towel-drying his hair, beads of water sliding down over his bare torso; he caught Chanyeol looking at him and smiled. "Hey, stop checking out my hot body!” There was a droplet nestled just above the bow of his lips, and the desire to kiss it away was so strong that Chanyeol felt like looking elsewhere. But he couldn't take his eyes off Baekhyun even if he’d wanted to.

“I’ll stop checking you out if you stop being hot,” he said softly, biting his lip, and Baekhyun whipped him playfully with his wet towel. He then spread it out next to where Chanyeol was sitting, lay down on top of it and very quickly dozed off. Chanyeol envied him, being able to fall asleep so easily. He made peculiar noises in his sleep, sort of whimpering to himself; it was weirdly cute, but a little unsettling. Chanyeol lay next to him, propped up on one elbow, watching him sleep until at last he stirred and sat upright, rubbing his eyes and squinting at the brightness of the afternoon sun.

"Are you tired?" Chanyeol asked in a quiet voice. "Should we go?”

Baekhyun yawned and nodded his agreement. He looked so cute and sleepy that Chanyeol wanted to wrestle him back down onto the sand and cuddle the life out of him, but he didn't.

“We can go home now, if you want,” he said to Baekhyun when they were back inside the van. "Up to you. I don't mind either way."

Baekhyun shook his head. “Not yet. We've come all this way, so we might as well squeeze a bit more in."

"Alright, take me somewhere else then. A place you really love, or that means something to you.” Chanyeol smiled and added, “let's just try and keep it within the same state, okay?"

Baekhyun tapped a finger against his lips, looking thoughtful for a moment. "I think I know a place," he said, with a cryptic little smile of his own. “And it's not too far away, I promise."

 

It would have been a quicker exit if they hadn't stopped every time someone flagged them down to buy an ice cream; only when they'd left the beach far behind was Chanyeol able to drive further than a hundred metres at a time. They mostly spent the next fifteen minutes in silence, with Baekhyun only speaking up to tell Chanyeol where to go, but otherwise revealing nothing about where they were headed. When they reached a turn-off that led onto a narrow, gravel-strewn dirt road walled on both sides by thick scrub, he told Chanyeol to turn into it.

"Where are you taking me right now?” Chanyeol asked, glancing over at him warily, “because this is beginning to look an awful lot like a good place to hide a body."

Baekhyun laughed through his nose. "Just keep driving,” he said.

"I don't even know if the van was made to drive on this kind of road.” Chanyeol’s dad was generally a pretty laid-back sort of guy, but he’d probably still hit the roof if the van got wrecked.

"It'll be fine," Baekhyun assured him. "It gets really muddy here when it rains, so you'd probably get bogged then, but on a dry day like today you'll be right. Trust me, I’ve been here heaps of times.”

They drove along the dirt road for maybe another ten minutes, Chanyeol couldn't be sure. At last there came a clearing where they could see the sea and sky ahead, and a solitary white lighthouse that stood facing the edge of the cliff, a little way past two single-storey buildings that looked like old keepers’ cottages.

"What is this place?" Chanyeol asked when they got out of the van. There were no other people around, just the two of them and all that ocean — deep blue as far as the eye could see, and much farther still. It seemed so vast from where he stood that Chanyeol suddenly felt the need to hold his breath, though he didn’t know why.

"It's called Point Perpendicular.” Baekhyun stood a bit further ahead with his back to Chanyeol, both of his hands resting on his hips. "Nice view, hey?”

“It's incredible.” Chanyeol could hear the waves crashing against the rocks down below, and the whistling wind, but other than that it was quiet. “Although there’s something kinda lonely about it at the same time.”

"I brought someone I loved here, once," Baekhyun said quietly, without turning around. “We kissed for the first time near that old lighthouse."

Chanyeol didn't know what to make of this unsolicited information, so he said nothing. Baekhyun didn't look at him; he just walked along ahead in the direction of the lighthouse, and only when he was nearer to it did he shoot Chanyeol a quick glance over his shoulder. "You wanna make a new memory together, Chanyeol?"

Chanyeol shrugged. "Sure, I guess.”

"Then follow me.”

Chanyeol followed Baekhyun over to the lighthouse in silence, his heart pounding in his throat. When they got there, Baekhyun turned around to face him; he took a few steps backwards, leaning his back against the whitewashed wall. “Come here,” he whispered. The wind had picked up, blowing his blue hair in all directions, and his voice was so soft that Chanyeol almost didn’t hear him speak. He took a couple of steps towards him.

“Come closer,” Baekhyun said. “ _Closer_. Don’t be shy.” He repeated this until Chanyeol was standing right in front of him, their feet only a few inches apart.

“Okay,” Chanyeol said softly, searching Baekhyun’s eyes for answers, and finding none that he could work with. But then they began to crinkle with a smile, and Baekhyun lifted a hand up to touch his face.

“You have the prettiest eyes,” he whispered, tracing the line of Chanyeol’s jaw with his fingertips. “You really do.”

“Oh. Well, yours are really pretty too.” Chanyeol laughed shyly. Now that they were so close, he wondered if Baekhyun could hear his wildly beating heart, or if it might be sending tremors into the earth that he would feel through his feet. It certainly felt like that was possible. From the way Baekhyun was still looking at him, with such unblinking intensity, he felt like he had to say something. But what?

“So… what now?” he said, and Baekhyun’s response was to throw both arms around his neck, pressing up against his body, and then he stood on his toes and kissed Chanyeol full on the lips. It caught Chanyeol a little off guard at first, but he happily went along with it. For a moment he was stunned by the electric thrill of Baekhyun’s tongue entering his mouth. His lips were soft and tasted faintly salty, and Chanyeol could smell the ocean on him — on his skin and in his windswept hair, still damp from their earlier swim. He heard Baekhyun's breathing change, quickening slightly when he moved away from his mouth to leave a trail of tiny kisses along his jaw and then down his neck. As his lips brushed over the place where Baekhyun’s neck met his shoulder, he tasted the sea once more. Baekhyun shivered slightly, his arms tightening around Chanyeol’s body, and they stood there a little longer, leaning against the lighthouse with their foreheads still touching. Eventually Chanyeol pulled away, even though it felt like every atom of his existence was against it.

"How was that for you?" Baekhyun asked, looking up at him through half-closed eyes. He was smiling.

Chanyeol was still a little too speechless to say anything worthwhile, but he gave it a go. "Yeah, it was, um... yeah. Very nice."

Baekhyun laughed. “Wow, so convincing," he said drily. He swatted Chanyeol’s bum and walked right past him, back in the direction of the van. "Alright, new memory made. Let's get out of here."

 

* * * * *

 

When they were driving back towards Nowra, Baekhyun leaned forward in his seat, pointing to something in the distance. “See that sign up ahead that says ‘Greenwell Point’? Chuck a right into that road.”

“We’re not going home?”

“Not yet,” Baekhyun said. “One more stop.”  After a couple of minutes of driving past nothing but paddock after field after paddock, he told Chanyeol to pull up outside a small building with a corrugated iron roof in the middle of an empty gravel yard, with green circular fibreglass tables and matching chairs scattered all around it. “Wait here a sec,” he said, shutting the van door behind him, and then he disappeared inside the building. He came out again a little later with a polystyrene tray in his hand, and as he came closer, Chanyeol saw that it was packed full of fresh oysters. Raw, shucked open, straight off the rock, or wherever it was that oysters came from — Chanyeol didn't know, or care to know.

He made a wrinkly-nosed face at the tray. “Really..?”

Baekhyun nodded. He motioned for Chanyeol to get out of the van. “Yep. Come sit with me.”

They sat down at one of the circular tables, and Baekhyun unwrapped the plastic film covering the tray. He squeezed the juice from a lemon wedge over an oyster and held it out towards Chanyeol. “Just try one and I'll leave you alone,” he said. “If you don't like it then I won’t argue with you. Just means there’ll be more for me."

“I've heard it’s like swallowing a load," Chanyeol said, wrinkling his nose again as he took the oyster from Baekhyun. He took a tentative sniff. It didn't really smell like much, apart from seawater.

Baekhyun laughed and shook his head. “Yuck! You’d be lucky if any load you swallowed tasted even half as good as this. Why do I hang out with you again?”

“You make it sound like we’ve actually hung out more than one and a half times.”

“Mmm. Kinda feels like we have, though.” Baekhyun smiled, then gestured at Chanyeol’s oyster, which he was still holding in his hand. “You gonna eat that, or are you waiting for a pearl to form?”

Chanyeol studied the little grey-white blob nestled in the shell in his hand. “I don’t even know what to do with it, really.”

Baekhyun let out a long stream of air through his nose, but otherwise managed to hold in his impatience. “Just hold it up to your mouth and sort of… I dunno, use your tongue to slide it in."

“You know, you’re not really selling this to me," Chanyeol said.

“Alright, alright.” Baekhyun picked up an oyster, sucked the meat out of it, and dropped the empty shell onto the table with a chalky clunk. “See? Just like that. Loosen it with your finger if you need to, and suck it a little bit to get all the juice out. That's the best part.”

Chanyeol did as he was told, and the cold slimy thing slid right into his mouth. Scrunching his eyes shut, he chewed a couple of times before daring to swallow. It tasted strongly of the sea, but in a surprisingly good way — the texture something between creamy and gelatinous, with a faintly metallic aftertaste. When he opened his eyes again, he saw Baekhyun looking at him expectantly, wearing a hopeful expression.

“Well?” he said, “was that so bad?”

“Actually, it was pretty good,” Chanyeol replied, and he meant it. To his own surprise, he ended up polishing off half the tray, and Baekhyun didn't protest. He seemed really happy that they’d discovered something else they both liked.

 

By the time they left the oyster shop, it was already late afternoon. From the corner of his eye, Chanyeol saw Baekhyun looking out the window, watching the fields speckled with black-and-white cattle passing them by.

"What's on your mind?" he asked, breaking the silence. Baekhyun seemed so far away that he didn’t really expect him to answer, and he was quiet a little longer before he did.

"I swear when we were on the way here, that cow lying under the giant fig back there looked like it was dead,” he said, turning his head away from the glass. “Now we just drove past it again, and it was definitely alive."

Chanyeol blinked a couple of times at the road ahead of him. "Alright. It's just that from the way you were staring out the window so intently, I imagined something a bit deeper was going on in there. But that's fine."

Baekhyun laughed. "Shut up, man."

"Are you sure it was even the same cow?" Chanyeol had a hard time trying to keep a straight face at that point. The laughter tickled the back of his throat, threatening to escape. "Maybe it was both dead and alive at the same time. Schrödinger's cow."

"You're a dickhead," Baekhyun said, but he still let out a gigantic snort — he was clearly trying not to give Chanyeol the satisfaction of laughing at him, and failing to do so. Chanyeol teased him for a bit longer until the joke eventually wore itself out, and they sat mostly in silence for the rest of the time. It wasn't uncomfortable or awkward in any way, and he turned some music on for a bit of background noise. Baekhyun sang along with the song on the radio — _‘you’ve got a ribbon of rainbows, the sun in your eyes burning through; could be I’m happy and sad, could be I’m losing my head over you’_ — and his singing voice was sweet and clear. He grabbed Chanyeol’s hand one time while they were stopped at the lights, somewhere near Albion Park, holding it for a few seconds before letting it go.

 

“Thanks for letting me come along today," he said when they arrived back at his place, by which time the sun had already begun to set, colouring the sky in sorbet swirls of pink and orange. He turned to look at Chanyeol and smiled. “I had a great time.”

“Me too.” Chanyeol took off his sunglasses, pushing them up to the top of his head. He opened his mouth to say something else, and hesitated.

“What?” Baekhyun asked in a quiet voice, his brow furrowing slightly. “What is it?”

"Can I kiss you?" Chanyeol said. Baekhyun had been brave enough to make their first kiss happen, after all, and the very least he could do was initiate a parting one.

Baekhyun shrugged. "Sure.”

There was something transactional about this exchange of words, the sealing of the deal. The kiss was softer this time, and a little more reserved — all things that, as far as Chanyeol could tell, Baekhyun was not. But he lingered a little at the end, his parted lips just barely touching Chanyeol’s, and Chanyeol kissed him one more time, very gently, cupping the side of his face with one hand.

"I don't taste like an oyster, do I?" Baekhyun asked, smiling into the kiss.

Chanyeol laughed and pulled away. "Nah. You taste even better.” He brushed a few strands of blue hair out of Baekhyun's eyes. "Alright, I’ll let you go now.”

"You can call me next time, if you want," Baekhyun said quietly. "I'd really like it if you did.”

“Okay.” Chanyeol watched him open the door and hop out of the van. “I already can't wait to kiss you again.”

Baekhyun peered in at him through the open door. “Do you want one more for the road?”

Chanyeol shook his head. "I do, so badly... but I want you to leave me hanging. Make me feel the burn. And then when I kiss you next, it'll be the best fucking kiss of my life.”

"Alright, then. Suit yourself." Baekhyun blew Chanyeol a kiss from the door instead, laughing when he pretended to catch it and put it in his pocket. “Saving it for later, huh?”

"Maybe," Chanyeol said, returning Baekhyun's smile. And when he saw the way Baekhyun was looking at him, with a tenderness that belied the merely two days they'd spent in each other's company, he found that he couldn't speak. If he said one more thing, he would have said many, and they would have been there all night.

"Go on,” Baekhyun said. He closed the door, still smiling at Chanyeol through the window. “Put the chime on for me while you drive away."

Chanyeol grinned back at him. “Are you serious..?”

"As serious as a heart attack."

Chanyeol laughed and nodded his head. He turned the chime on, the tune of Greensleeves filling the quiet street. “It sounds twice as creepy when it’s getting dark out, doesn’t it?”

“Just a bit. I’ll see you soon." Baekhyun made a telephone gesture with one hand, holding it up to his face and raising his voice above the sound of the engine. "Call me, okay?”

“I will,” Chanyeol yelled back at him. “See you later, gorgeous.” He could still feel the tingle on his mouth from Baekhyun's kiss as he drove away.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playlist for Chapter 2:  
> 1\. [Adventure - Alexandros](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTfKFMqkhGg)  
> 2\. [Crazy - Icehouse](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VryeDBTICg)  
> 3\. [Strangers - Tia Gostelow](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWs-fGb4L8Q)  
> 4\. [Suspension - Mae](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDMcotLp2yY)  
> 5\. [Beautiful To Me - Little Birdy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zxEI-Nis7E)


	3. Waiting for the sun

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes about this chapter:  
> \- ‘Maccas’ is just what Australian people call McDonald's  
> \- Goon is cheap wine that comes in a box. A goon bag or goon sack is the foil bag inside the box that holds the wine. An inexpensive way to get drunk, but tastes like piss and makes you feel like death the next day

 

_______________________________

 

_ March 12th _

_ Today I woke up to hear you already awake, pottering around my apartment — which could now be considered  _ _ our _ _ apartment, even if you refuse to admit to it yet — and I think about how very ‘you’ it is, sneaking around to try not to wake me, only to end up making more noise in the process. I was not annoyed; it only made me chuckle into my pillow. There is nothing you could ever do that is quiet or subtle; I find myself marvelling at how big it is, this space you have carved for yourself inside my heart, and how small and empty my life would feel if you were to ever leave. _

_ I think the reason I write all these things down is because I am desperate not to forget them; to forget any part of you, no matter how small. But then I always think to myself, how could I? _

 

_______________________________

  
  
  
  
  


Chanyeol arrived at work on Monday morning with a spring in his step that seemed noticeable to everyone but him. Chaerin looked up with a quirked eyebrow when he practically bounced into her office, carrying a cardboard tray of takeaway coffees in one hand. 

“My, my… someone looks sprightly today,” she said. “You must’ve slept very well over the weekend."

"Mmm. Something like that." Chanyeol set down her usual coffee order on her desk — double-shot soy latte, no sugar. "Who even uses the word 'sprightly' in everyday conversation?"

Thanking him with a little nod, Chaerin picked up the cup and took a sip. “I don’t know. People who read, maybe..?”

"I'm a people who reads, thank you very much,” Chanyeol huffed, but he wasn't offended, really.

Chaerin smiled to herself. "If you say so. Thanks for the coffee, by the way. My shout tomorrow.”

"No probs,” Chanyeol said. He was about to leave the room when Chaerin waved him back over to her desk.

“A friendly reminder that I want to see a draft for that piece on local lifeguards before lunchtime,” she said, smiling at him. “Now that you’re full of beans again, you’ll have no excuse to keep me waiting.”

“Yes, boss.” Chanyeol threw her a quick salute on his way through the door, nearly spilling coffee all over himself in the process. He didn’t look back to see if she was shaking her head at him, but it was pretty much a given.

 

Finding himself with a bit of spare time in the afternoon, he went to visit Minseok during his break, and they sat in the office at the back of the showroom and ate lunch together. "So I might be dating someone at the moment,” he said while they were eating, trying to broach the subject as casually as possible. 

Minseok immediately put down his lunch box. His cheeks were still full of food, which made him look like an adorable hamster. "Really? Who?" Almost as soon as he asked, he swallowed and said, “wait — is it Noodle Palace Hottie?”

Chanyeol smiled around a mouthful of kimchi fried rice, but he said nothing.

“It is!“ Minseok pointed at Chanyeol with his fork, which he then started waving around wildly. "I can't believe you actually pulled it off! What did you ask him? What did he say?”

"You're gonna take someone's eye out with that thing," Chanyeol said. "Anyway, maybe it's too early to call it 'dating', as such.” He paused, watching Minseok keying something into his phone, so quickly that his fingers were a blur of movement. “What are you doing..?”

Sehun burst through the door of Minseok’s office less than thirty seconds later, his overalls and hands all streaked with grease. He pointed a blackened finger in Chanyeol’s direction. "You scored a date with Noodle Palace Hottie!" he said, making it sound like an accusation. He finished wiping his hands on the oily rag hanging out of his pocket, and then threw it at Chanyeol's head. "Why am I only finding out about this now?!" He switched into Korean for the second sentence, which he tended to do whenever he was emotional about something.

“I was sort of waiting until I knew whether he actually liked me, first," Chanyeol said, laughing nervously. “I mean, we’ve only really been out together once—”

" _I_ had the idea to set you up with him in the first place, just in case this shithead here tries to steal my thunder." Sehun picked the rag up off the floor and threw it at Minseok instead, who flinched as he copped it full in the face.

“I think what Sehun’s trying to say,” he said, tossing the rag back at Sehun with a menacing look, “is that he’s happy for you. We both are.”

“Well, yeah. Of course I’m happy for him.” Sehun parked his bum on the edge of Minseok’s desk for a moment, leaning into him a little when Minseok curled a protective arm around his waist. “Noodle Palace Hottie seems like a nice guy, Yeol. And have you seen his hair? Who the hell looks  _ that _ good with blue hair?”

“He has a name, you know… it’s Baekhyun.” Chanyeol shot both of his friends a suspicious look. "Exactly how often do you two even order from that place?”

"On average? Maybe once a week. Sometimes twice.” Minseok shrugged. “Hey, the food's really good.”

 

Chanyeol’s lunchtime discussion with his friends only drove home the following fact: that he still had yet to give Baekhyun a call, just like he’d asked. The thought of calling him posed many unsettling questions. First of all, did Chanyeol need a real reason to call, like to organise another date? Was it okay to call Baekhyun up just to talk? If he called too late at night, could it be mistaken for a booty call? If he called too early, would Baekhyun still be at work? In the end, he decided to wait until the next day; but then before he knew it, it was already Tuesday evening, and he’d lost his nerve all over again.

He figured he’d wait until after dinner. After having a shower. After one episode of Criminal Minds. (Maybe two episodes of Criminal Minds...)

Chanyeol checked the time — now it was twenty to nine. What if Baekhyun was busy? Was 8.40pm too late to call him? Maybe he'd send a text first; that seemed safer, less invasive.

The other issue at hand was, what the hell was he going to say? Chanyeol switched off the TV and picked up his phone, staring at the blank message box.  _ ‘Sup _ , he wrote, but he deleted this almost as soon as he typed it, and then he tried a nice, casual  _ ‘how’s it going?’ _ instead. Soon he deleted that, too. They both sounded too friendly. For someone with a degree in communications, he was having a lot of trouble choosing his words.

_ Hello,  _ he wrote.

In the end, he read the text about twelve times before he sent it — and all it said was  _ 'hello' _ . It made Chanyeol want to slam his head against the nearest hard surface, but he resisted the urge; he would need all his brain cells in working order if Baekhyun happened to respond.

Sure enough, a couple of seconds later, the message tone pinged on his phone. He picked it up to read what was there:

_ Hello. _

Chanyeol quickly typed in the wittiest, most imaginative reply he could think of —  _ Hello _ — and sent it back to him.

Another couple of seconds later: … _ Hello _ . This time it was followed by a bored-looking emoji.

They could go back and forth like that all night, Chanyeol thought; it was clear to him by then that Baekhyun wasn't going to give up anything else until he made a proper move, so he bit the bullet and tried something a bit different:  _ I miss you. _

As soon as he sent the text, Chanyeol cringed, tossed his phone over to the other side of the sofa and buried his blushing face in one of the armrests, letting out a little whimper of despair. The phone began to ring, and he peered at it through the gaps between his fingers. Sighing, he reached for it and answered the call.

When he picked up, Baekhyun was already breathless with laughter. “You miss me, huh? That was quick."

"I know," Chanyeol sighed, but he couldn't help laughing too. He rolled onto his back with his knees drawn up, his feet flat against the sofa cushion. “I know I'm a lost cause. You don't have to tell me."

If Baekhyun agreed with him, he was gracious enough not to say so. Now that he’d stopped laughing, his voice took on a gentler tone. "Why didn't you just call me?” 

"I don’t know.” Chanyeol felt like an idiot, but Baekhyun deserved his honesty. "Because you're a babe, and you make me feel shy. And I haven’t been able to stop thinking about kissing you since Sunday arvo.”

He heard Baekhyun's soft laughter through the phone again. "You're too cute. I really want to see you."

“What, right now?” Chanyeol sat up straight, pressing the phone to his ear.

“Yeah, right now. I just finished my shift at the Palace, so I'm free."

“It's nearly 9 on a weeknight,” Chanyeol pointed out, although he already knew that this wouldn’t stop him if Baekhyun really did want to meet up.

Baekhyun didn’t seem to think this was a problem either. “And? Do you have anywhere else to be?”

“Well, no," Chanyeol admitted. "You got me there."

"Good. I dunno about you, but I'm pretty hungry — how about a late-night Maccas run? I can come pick you up, if you want."

“Well I’ve already had dinner, but I guess I could eat again. And I’m not riding on the back of Buzz, if that's what you're thinking."

Baekhyun sighed audibly through the phone. "Fine — you come pick  _ me _ up, then. You know where I live."

“Alright, I will. See you soon." In his excitement, Chanyeol almost tripped over his own size 11 feet on the way to his bedroom to get changed. It took him ten whole minutes to decide on a simple yellow hoodie and jeans. He then spent a further five minutes in front of the mirror, attempting to make his terrible pink-blond hair with the now obvious dark roots look somewhat less of a disaster. In the end, it didn't look too bad. A spritz (or a splash) of cologne and he was ready to face the (sexy, flirty, frustrating) beast.

 

By the time Chanyeol arrived out the front of Baekhyun’s place, it was already well past nine o'clock. He’d barely pulled up the handbrake when the passenger door flung open and he saw Baekhyun standing there, looking a little worried. "Hey, what took you so long? I almost thought you weren’t gonna show.”

“Of course I was gonna show… I just wanted to spend a bit of time looking good for you." Chanyeol turned to look at Baekhyun as he climbed into the car, making kissy faces at him. He tried to make the ‘I just wanted to look good for you’ excuse sound like a joke, even though it was 100% what had actually happened — but Baekhyun didn’t need to know that. Maybe the cologne was a bit obvious, now that he thought about it; he’d put on so much that he’d stunk out the entire car, but it was too late to worry about that now.

"Really? I'm touched." Baekhyun’s tone was dry — some would even say sarcastic — but he leaned over to give Chanyeol a soft kiss on the lips anyway.

Chanyeol broke the kiss, very reluctantly, and put the car into drive, pulling away from the side of the road. "We’ve arrived at the 'kissing each other hello' stage now, I see. I quite like this development.”

“That’s good, because I plan to do a lot of kissing tonight. Not just at the beginning and the end,” Baekhyun said, fastening his seatbelt. “Nice car, by the way. I didn't have you pegged for a mint-green Skyline kind of guy, but I guess I can see it now.”

“Thanks... it’s nearly twenty years old. A bit past its prime, but it gets me from A to B.”

Baekhyun scoffed. “It’s still a dickhead car, no matter what year it was made. Don’t try to play it down.”

“Okay, so here’s the deal,” Chanyeol said. “I’ll reserve all my judgements surrounding Buzz if you leave Minty alone.”

“Alright, alright. Don’t get your tits in a twist,” Baekhyun replied under his breath. When Chanyeol glanced over at him, he was staring out the window and smiling to himself.   
  


Chanyeol drove them both to Flagstaff Hill after they’d picked up their food from the McDonalds drive-thru, and they sat in the park to eat, perched side-by-side on the lower end of one of the three war memorial cannons facing the ocean. Baekhyun swung his legs in the air while he took a big bite out of his burger; he got a blob of Big Mac sauce on his face, and something about it made Chanyeol’s stomach feel funny. It could have been that he hadn't had proper junk food in a while, and it wasn't really agreeing with him. “You’ve got a little something here,” he said, tapping the side of his face with a finger, and Baekhyun just looked at him and shrugged, like he already knew about it and didn't care. At some point he must have wiped it away, though, because the next time Chanyeol looked over at him, the blob was gone. 

“So how was your day?” Chanyeol asked, unwrapping his second cheeseburger and taking a bite.

As usual, Baekhyun didn’t bother swallowing before he replied; he just talked with his mouth full. “I had a day shift at the bookshop, and then an evening one at the Palace. Pretty standard.”

“Isn’t that tiring, working two jobs in one day?” Chanyeol thought about the next day’s deadlines, and shuddered. “Sometimes I can barely handle the one."

Baekhyun paused to pull the pickle out of his burger, chucking it onto the grass, and then he resumed eating. “I don’t work back-to-back shifts every day. Anyway, working at the bookshop isn’t too strenuous. It’s a pretty chill gig, usually nothing much happens — a lot of the time I just sit at the front counter reading. Although the other day I walked in on some guy having a bit of fun with himself in the erotica section, and I had to call security to come and get rid of him."

Chanyeol nearly choked on a mouthful of watery Diet Coke. “Wow. Feral.”

“Yeah,” Baekhyun said, chuckling to himself. “Well, I just laughed it off. What else can you do, really.”

After they'd finished eating, Baekhyun pulled his gym bag up from the ground, sitting it on his lap.  “Look what I've got," he singsonged, unzipping the bag, and Chanyeol could see a flash of silver inside it. "The only thing that could possibly make our little Maccas date  _ even more _ classy than it already is.”

"What's that?" Chanyeol craned his neck to peer inside the mouth of the bag, trying not to think too hard about Baekhyun’s use of the word 'date’, even if it was preceded by the word 'Maccas'.

Baekhyun pulled the silver thing out of the bag completely, and Chanyeol saw that it was a goon sack. "Good old Sunnyvale dry red. It was a toss-up between that or the fruity lexia, but the dry red won.”

Chanyeol laughed and shook his head. "I can't believe you brought that with you," he said. "You should’ve at least gone with the fruity lexia. Everyone knows fruity lexia makes you sexier.”

“Meh, I'm already sexy enough. And the last time I had a date with fruity lexia, it ended in tears, and a night spent hugging the toilet,” Baekhyun said with a smile. “I still haven’t really forgiven her for that. Anyway, I just felt like revisiting my youth.” 

He was only 24, Chanyeol thought, and yet he wanted to 'revisit his youth'. He  glanced at the silver bag nestled in Baekhyun’s lap, cringing at the memories it conjured up. “I used to get the most incredible hangovers after drinking that stuff. There was a time when just thinking about it was enough to make me gag.”

Baekhyun snorted out a laugh. He opened the spout of the goon sack and had a squirt, then offered it to Chanyeol. "Can I tempt you?"

Not wanting to poop all over their little party, Chanyeol took the sack from him for a tiny sip, making a face of disgust as he passed it back. "Okay, I regret that already."

Baekhyun grinned and lifted the sack up over his head, releasing a steady waterfall of shitty red wine into his mouth. “Just a warning... tonight could descend into debauchery quite quickly," he said, wiping his lips on the back of his hand. "If I end up pole-dancing around a street light, then you’ll know why."

“Yeah? I dare you to go pole-dance around that sign over there," Chanyeol said, pointing at the sign in question. "The one that says this park is an alcohol-free zone.”

“Alright, you’re on. Just let me have a bit more of this first." Baekhyun poured some more goon into his mouth — a lot of it, really — and then passed it over to Chanyeol again. "Hold my sack for me, would you?”

He walked over to the sign and took his position at the pole, grabbing on to it with both hands, and then he began to dance around it. He provided his own ‘sexy’ music, mimicking the sounds of a brass band at a cabaret show; throwing one leg around the pole, he swung around it, then turned his back to it, lowering himself all the way to the ground. He was actually a half-decent dancer, Chanyeol thought, but he still couldn’t keep himself from laughing. He could tell from the way Baekhyun wobbled a bit that he was well on the way to being shitfaced; it was probably a good idea to distract him like this, long enough to keep him away from the goon, even if it only lasted for a couple of minutes. He cheered Baekhyun on, all the way to the end of his little performance, clapping so hard his hands began to hurt.

“Well done,” he said, giving Baekhyun the honour of a standing ovation, which made the goon sack tumble from his lap onto the ground. “I think you’ve found your true calling.”

“Yeah, right.” Baekhyun stopped to catch his breath, leaning back against the pole. His whole body shook with his laughter. “Ahh. That was fun, though.”

Before Chanyeol could say anything more, he felt a drop of something land on top of his head. He held a hand out, palm facing upwards, feeling for rain. “I think it’s starting to sprinkle,” he said. Very quickly, more and more droplets began to fall, clinging to the grass like shining crystals, making dark spots form on the surface of the concrete slab beneath the cannon. “Uh oh.”

“We should get in the car," Baekhyun said; he picked up his bag and shoved the goon sack into it, throwing the strap over his shoulder. "Before it really starts pissing down."

They hurried over to the car, still laughing, and piled into the back of it; it was only a two-door model, and Chanyeol had to push the driver’s seat all the way forward so they could squeeze through. There was barely enough room in there for Chanyeol on his own, let alone the pair of them. “Sorry,” he said, “I know it's a bit squishy in here. But at least we’ll be dry.”

Baekhyun leaned back with his head against the seat. "That's alright. I don't mind you invading my space if you don’t mind me invading yours.” The goon sack lay forgotten somewhere inside his gym bag, which Chanyeol was relieved about, since Baekhyun seemed tipsy enough as it was. Being a bit drunk only made him even chattier than usual; they talked for a little while about everything (and sometimes nothing), and Chanyeol soon forgot about the time.

"So,” Baekhyun said, when it felt like they’d finally hit a lull in their conversation; he was quiet for a moment, licking his lips. In the light from the street lamp outside, Chanyeol could see they were still stained a little from the wine. 

He looked down at his lap, shoving both hands into the front pocket of his hoodie. "So…” he echoed shyly.

Baekhyun leaned over to whisper in his ear. “Wanna make out?” His breath on Chanyeol’s neck made every hair stand on end.

"You really don't muck around, do you?" Chanyeol laughed, but he kept his eyes downcast until Baekhyun scooted across the backseat, swinging one leg over him to straddle his thighs. With his hands on either side of Chanyeol’s face, he leaned down and kissed him on the mouth, nibbling gently on his lower lip.

Chanyeol tried his hardest not to groan into the kiss, but it came out anyway, low in the back of his throat. “Please,” he whispered, “don't do that.” 

"Do what? This?” Baekhyun gave Chanyeol's lip another little bite, slightly harder than the first.

"You know what I’m talking about.”

“Why not?” Baekhyun moved away from Chanyeol's mouth to kiss the side of his neck instead. “Because it hurts?”

“No. Because you’re turning me on.” Chanyeol was already short of breath, but he didn’t have it in him to pull away. It was all he could do not to roll his hips up so they could rub against each other, if only for a second or two.

Baekhyun laughed at that. “Why’s that a bad thing? I won't torture you too much, don't worry… I'll keep it PG. Sort of.”

"Yeah, right,” Chanyeol said, laughing through his nostrils. “We’ll see about that."

Things progressed quickly, then. Baekhyun's hands roamed underneath Chanyeol’s hoodie, caressing his stomach, before skimming up the sides of his body to rub circles over his chest. His breath was warm and heavy on Chanyeol’s lips, his wine-sweet tongue slipping inside his mouth to taste him. Chanyeol shivered when his fingers grazed a nipple, and tilted his head back against the seat, opening his mouth a little wider to let Baekhyun in. He kept his own hands firmly planted on Baekhyun’s waist, just to be safe. The rain pattered against the car windows, and when he opened his eyes for a second he saw that the glass was starting to fog up. This was probably a good thing. 

He broke away from the kiss to catch his breath, panting into the crook of Baekhyun's neck. “Do you reckon anyone walks around here at night..?”

“It's dark and raining," Baekhyun said, pressing a playful little kiss to one corner of Chanyeol's lips. "Do you see anyone out there?”

"Nah,” Chanyeol replied, although at that point the windows were hard to see through. Through the condensation he could still make out the hazy, luminescent mass of the moon, shining through the droplets of water as they chased each other down the smooth surface of the glass. For a moment he could only stare at it, mesmerised. “Look how beautiful the moon is.”

"Mmm. Not as beautiful as you.” Baekhyun guided Chanyeol's head back towards him with a gentle hand beneath his chin, and began to kiss him again, soft and slow. "Anyway, don’t worry about people seeing us... we have all our clothes on, don’t we? And no one’s gonna be wandering around in this shit weather.”

With the way Baekhyun was kissing him, Chanyeol didn't know if their clothes would stay on for much longer, but he kept this thought to himself. "Stop," he whispered into Baekhyun's mouth, “just… slow down. I really like kissing you, but I need some air."

Baekhyun pulled away, looking at him with an expression that Chanyeol hoped was one of concern, and not offence. “Well, we don’t have to make out if you don't want to."

Chanyeol's hands wandered slowly along the sides of Baekhyun's thighs, settling at last upon his waist again. “It’s not that. But can I be honest with you?” When Baekhyun nodded, he said, “you really are gorgeous, and amazing. And you have to believe me when I say that having you here, like this, is an absolute fucking dream come true for me.”

Baekhyun sighed and moved away from Chanyeol's lap, collapsing onto the seat next to him. “Why do I smell a 'but' coming..?"

"Because I don't really feel right about doing this,” Chanyeol said quietly, turning to look at him. “Not right now. I think that maybe we should continue when you're a bit more… well. Sober.” He chewed his lip, searching Baekhyun's face for any sign of irritation. He didn't look too put out, thankfully; he looked more curious than anything else. “It's just that if something’s gonna happen between us, then I'd want us both to remember it, and enjoy it. I’d also prefer for it to happen somewhere a bit more comfortable than the back seat of my shitty old car.”

Baekhyun was quiet for a moment, and Chanyeol reached over to hold his hand; he kissed it, paying particular attention to the mole on his thumb. “I’m not in a huge hurry to get in your pants, you know. I can wait. There are other ways I’d like to get to know you first.”

Baekhyun laughed a little and nodded his head. “It’s okay… you're right. I mean, I'm not  _ that _ drunk. But I respect what you're saying.” He sighed and added, “goon always turns me into a horndog, though. I should’ve known this would happen.”

"We can still kiss, if you want to,” Chanyeol said quietly. "But maybe go a bit easier on the hands, because you’re making things hard for me. And I mean that literally.”

“You’re a good guy, Chanyeol. I think you just went right up to here in my estimation.” Smiling, Baekhyun held his hand right up to the ceiling. "And if this car's ceiling wasn't so bloody low, I'd be holding my hand up a lot higher right now.”

"Good to know." Chanyeol flicked Baekhyun’s chin with a finger. "Sorry,” he said with a smile, “I just noticed you had a sesame seed stuck to your face."

Baekhyun chuckled softly and leaned into him, kissing him on the cheek at first, then dipping a little lower to nuzzle his neck. "You're so sweet, you know that? The sweetest, sunniest sunflower. Yellow looks really good on you, too.”

“Thanks. It must be pretty late by now, hey,” Chanyeol said. A quick glance at the clock on the dashboard confirmed this suspicion. "If you’re tired, I can drop you home. I'm fine either way."

"Mmm... maybe not yet. Let’s have some tunes.” Baekhyun leaned forward, reaching between the front seats to turn the stereo on, and began singing along with  _ Songbird _ on the radio. “Oh, I _love_ this song."

Chanyeol had always loved that song too; he closed his eyes, smiling as he listened to Baekhyun's sweet, mellow voice.  _ Songbird, you’ve got tales to tell. How many times can you describe your living hell?  _ He felt Baekhyun reach across to hold his hand, his fingers dancing over the top of Chanyeol’s knuckles.

"You know,” he said, his voice lilting and playful. “I’m not really all that drunk anymore…”

Chanyeol fell silent, and Baekhyun must have felt his body stiffen a little, because he heaved out a loud sigh. “I’m not saying that because I want you to fuck me. I just... can I ask a favour?” When Chanyeol warily nodded his agreement, he said, “if I lie down, can I lay my head in your lap?”

"Yeah,” Chanyeol whispered, “of course." He wasn’t going to sleep with Baekhyun while he was drunk, but this request seemed innocent enough. Baekhyun lay down across the back seat with his knees bent up so he could fit, his head resting on top of Chanyeol’s legs. For a while he just lay there looking up at the ceiling, saying nothing, and then he started to cry. He wasn’t sobbing; he made no sound at all, but his eyes filled up with silent tears that trailed down over the sides of his face, and Chanyeol couldn’t bring himself to ask why. Cradling Baekhyun’s head in one hand, he bent forward to kiss some of the tears away, and then he leaned back again, stroking his hair and waiting patiently until he was ready to speak.

"Sorry," Baekhyun said at last; he let out a small laugh that sounded slightly waterlogged. "I probably should’ve mentioned that goon does that to me as well… makes me horny  _ and _ gets the waterworks going."

"It's okay," Chanyeol whispered. "Do you want to talk about it?”

Baekhyun let out a shaky breath and shook his head. “I just felt a bit overwhelmed for some reason. But I'm not upset.” He sat up and turned to face Chanyeol, throwing both arms around his shoulders and pulling him in close. “Thank you, though. For caring.”

“Of course I care. Feel better now?" Chanyeol pressed his lips against the side of Baekhyun’s neck. They stayed like that for a while, with their arms wrapped tightly around each other, not saying a word.

“Yeah. Keep doing that,” Baekhyun whispered. His breath caught in his throat when Chanyeol began kissing his neck in earnest, and he tilted his head a little to give him more room. “That feels good.”

With one hand beneath his chin, Chanyeol lifted Baekhyun’s head upwards, kissing him on the mouth instead; Baekhyun let him, and then he shifted until he lay on his back, pulling Chanyeol forward so that he fell halfway on top of him. His long legs ended up wedged uncomfortably in the space between the front and back seats, but he was too busy kissing Baekhyun — and enjoying it — to notice all that much.

Taking one of Chanyeol’s hands, Baekhyun moved it beneath his shirt, guiding it onto the warm skin of his stomach. "You can touch me here if you want.”

Chanyeol laughed. "You're persistent, I’ll give you that.” Still, he let his hand linger for a moment, tracing around Baekhyun’s navel with a finger — and earning a little shiver of pleasure  — before moving his hand away. He finished up with a friendly pat on Baekhyun’s belly — over the top of his clothes this time, instead of underneath them.

Baekhyun grinned, looking up at him through half-lidded eyes. “Well, it was worth a shot."

"Maybe next time. If you still want me to." Chanyeol lifted his head up, trying to see out the window. The rain seemed to have mostly stopped. “If I said I wanted to go out with you — like, exclusively — what would you say? Or is it too early for me to say that?”

"Doesn't it put you off, though?" Baekhyun's smile began to fade a little. “The idea of dating someone who doesn't really know what he wants...”

Chanyeol shrugged. “Why should it? I don’t expect you to have everything figured out. For now, I guess the only thing I need to know is whether you want me too.”

Baekhyun looked up at him for a moment, without replying; then he pulled Chanyeol’s head downwards, lifting himself up to meet him halfway. He kissed Chanyeol very softly on the mouth and whispered, "does this answer your question..?”

Chanyeol smiled against his lips. “It does.”

  
  


_______________________________

 

_ November 18th _

_ Okay, I lied — I’ve been lying to you this whole time. I don't actually start work at 9. I start at 8.30, but I always choose to go in late so I can sit on the balcony and have breakfast with you. I couldn't start my day any better, and I don't think I'd be able to leave home without partaking in this wonderful ritual. You have no idea how much these little things mean to me. _

_ You looked especially beautiful today, by the way — I was happy that I didn't feel like an idiot for telling you. You dive headfirst into each new day like nothing bad could possibly be lurking at the bottom of it. I almost find it an affront, just how irresistible you are in the morning. _

 

_______________________________

  
  
  


Chanyeol woke up with the sunlight burning red through his eyelids, and something warm and heavy on his lap. Looking down, he saw that it was Baekhyun. He was lying along the back seat, with his head resting on top of Chanyeol’s legs again. He was still fast asleep.

Chanyeol was sitting upright — and had fallen asleep like that, with his head rolled all the way back, if the stiffness in his neck was anything to go by. Apart from that, he'd slept surprisingly well; he couldn't recall waking up at all, or having any disturbing dreams. He ran his tongue along the front of his teeth. His mouth was dry and tasted like a stale version of whatever he’d eaten last night. He needed a coffee like he needed air.

Baekhyun stirred a little, rolling onto his side so that his face was almost buried in Chanyeol's stomach, but he didn’t wake up. Smiling to himself, Chanyeol began to stroke his hair.  _ I've known you for a week and a half, and here I am,  _ he thought. _ Waking up with you, in the back of my bloody car. _

He gently shook Baekhyun awake. "Hey, cutie. Wake up."

Baekhyun stirred again, scrunching up his face a little. "Mmm..?" he murmured, peering up at Chanyeol through half-closed eyes.

"We fell asleep," Chanyeol whispered. "In my car."

Baekhyun blinked a few times, his frown suggesting that he still hadn't worked out where the hell he was, and then his eyes grew wide. "Oh! Shit.”

Chanyeol laughed softly at the look on his face — the realisation morphing into horror, and finally resignation. "I'd better take you home,” he said. “It’s nearly 7 o'clock. I need to get ready for work."

Baekhyun nodded and sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Okay.”

"Should we stop past Maccas again for breakfast on the way?” Chanyeol asked, a smile tugging at the corners of his lips.

"Aww man... I don’t know if I could do Maccas twice in a row.” Baekhyun scratched at the back of his neck and thought about it for a moment. "You know what? Yeah I could."

Chanyeol laughed. He opened the door to let Baekhyun hop out first, and they each took their place at the front of the car. "Alright, let's go."

  
  
  


* * * * *

  
  


“Did you mean what you said last night?” With his hotcakes balanced on his knees, Baekhyun dipped a finger into the syrup container and sucked it clean. “That thing about wanting to go out with me exclusively. Or was it just one of those things you say while you’re half-asleep that you end up regretting in the morning?”

Chanyeol glanced over at Baekhyun, then picked his coffee up out of the cupholder, took a sip and put it back. “I meant every word,” he said. “Did you mean it when you said yes?”

“I didn’t say yes. I kissed you.”

“But the kiss meant ‘yes’, right..?”

Baekhyun laughed softly. “Yeah, it did.”

 

They pulled up outside Baekhyun's building, and Chanyeol parked the car and leaned over to kiss him goodbye, sliding his hands all through his blue hair. His lips tasted sweet, like hotcake syrup.

“I don't think I've ever felt this close to someone in such a short time,” Chanyeol whispered; he gave Baekhyun one more kiss, his heart already aching when the boy blessed him with one last lovely smile, before he closed the car door and disappeared down the driveway. When he was gone, Chanyeol checked himself out in the rearview mirror, inspecting the damage: he looked like shit again, and didn’t know what kind of story he could pull out of his arse to tell Chaerin. But he would worry about that when he got to work.

When he walked out of his bathroom later that morning, freshly showered and feeling a little less seedy, he found a message from Baekhyun on his phone. At first glance, it appeared to be a little poem of sorts. Chanyeol’s smile grew wider as he read:

 

_ My Sunny Sunflower, you're so very sweet _

_ You're 6-foot tall, from your head to your feet _

_ You look good in yellow _

_ You sexy young fellow _

_ I treasure the day I met you in the street :) x _

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playlist for Chapter 3:  
> 1\. [Moon Song - Alexandros](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FU5FxTP1cpw)  
> 2\. [Monochrome - The Sundays](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wK35Y2d-K9g)  
> 3\. [Atom Eyes - Guided By Voices](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzNtQsbueO0)  
> 4\. [Songbird - Bernard Fanning](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raxsAFOxRTE)  
> 5\. [Waiting for the Sun - Powderfinger](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ypgRyw5Imo)


	4. Purple

 

______________________________

 

_September 24th_

  _Do you want to know a dirty little secret? Ever since we got together, I think about sex a million times a day. (I haven’t actually counted, mind you, this is just a roundabout figure.) In fact, one of the only times I don’t really think about making love to you is while I’m making love to you — or while you’re making love to me — and that’s only because we’re too busy making love for me to think about it. In the heat of the moment, I lose all capacity for thought; I can only feel your love all around me, and everything else fades into the background._

_Sometimes I go to the bathroom at work and hide in one of the stalls, because I’ll be going about my business and suddenly my face will burn up at the memory of me touching you; of you touching me. Your skin on mine, the sounds you make, the taste of you. My cheeks and ears are always bright red when I see my reflection in the mirror. I catch myself wondering if you know what you do to me, and then I see that little glimmer in your eyes before you lean in to kiss me, and I know that you do. Of course you do._

_You're the sexiest thing alive. You flirt like flirting is breathing: with me, my friends, your friends, strangers, strangers' friends, the old woman who runs the Korean grocery on Crown Street — with everyone, anyone, anything. I'm convinced that you could smile at the sky on an overcast day, and the sun would come out just for you. The weird part is that I get such a kick out of watching you do it._

_Flirt with me more, baby — I love it. I love you._

 

______________________________

 

 

 

Chanyeol got a call from Minseok at work on a slow Wednesday afternoon, while he was in the middle of tending to the potted succulent on his desk instead of doing anything constructive. "Sehun and I are going out for barbecue on Friday," he said, when Chanyeol answered the call, "and we would both very much like it if you joined us."

"Is this because you actually want to hang out with me?" Chanyeol asked, "or are you secretly hoping I'll bring ‘Noodle Palace Hottie’ along so you can finally meet him?”

"What do you mean?” Minseok had the nerve to sound offended; Chanyeol could practically hear him pouting through the phone. “Of _course_ we want to hang out with you — but yes, bring Noodle Palace Hottie along too, that's totally fine.”

Chanyeol laughed. “You can’t pull the wool over my eyes, Kim… but okay. He might be working that night, for all I know, but I'll invite him. And his name is Baekhyun, as I’ve mentioned about a thousand times before.”

“Oh, I know that.” Chanyeol could tell Minseok was smiling now, from the sound of his voice alone. “I'll see you both on Friday," he added, with emphasis on the ‘both’, which was a little presumptuous, admittedly. 

 

It turned out Baekhyun was meant to be working at the Palace that day, but he told Chanyeol it would be easy enough to swap his shift to Thursday, and that was what he ended up doing. When Chanyeol picked him up on Friday night, he gave him the lowdown in the car. "So we're having dinner with my two closest friends tonight. Their names are Minseok and Sehun. You might recognise them because they order from Noodle Palace all the time. Minseok was the one who recommended it to begin with."

Baekhyun laughed at that. "Well, the noodles at the Palace _are_ very good. In my entirely unbiased opinion.”

"Sure, sure." While they were stopped at a red light, Chanyeol pulled down the sun visor to quickly check his hair in the mirror. Wendy had dyed it a rich cherry red over the weekend, and although he'd felt like Ronald McDonald at first, the colour was starting to grow on him, if only because Baekhyun seemed to love it.

"So how long have you known these friends of yours, then?” Baekhyun asked, moving the conversation along. “And stop fussing with your hair, it looks fine.”

“I went to high school with Minseok," Chanyeol replied, quickly pushing the visor back into place. "He was actually in the year above me, but we became friends through my older sister, who was in the same class as him. Sehun is his boyfriend; they've been together for nearly five years now. He works at the same motorcycle dealership as Minseok, but he's a mechanic in their service department, while Minseok is the head of sales. And we're going out for barbecue, because Korean food is one out of about three different cuisines that Sehun will eat." He stopped talking, shooting Baekhyun an apologetic look. "Sorry, was that information overload?”

"Not at all. I can process more than one idea at a time,” Baekhyun said wryly. “Not just a pretty face, you know.”

"I know. I just wouldn't want to overwhelm you or anything.” Chanyeol spotted a free space out the front of the restaurant — without a bloody parking meter anywhere in sight, which made it a double score — and he zoomed in to grab it before anyone else could, parking the car in record time. "Anyway,” he added, “they’ve been pestering me to meet you for the past couple of weeks, so I apologise in advance if they seem a bit full on.”

Baekhyun put a comforting hand on top of Chanyeol's leg, stroking the length of it. "I'm looking forward to meeting them too,” he said gently. “It’s fine. Don't stress."

"I’m not stressed. But I haven't dated anyone in a good while, and I think they're just excited for me." The hand on his thigh made Chanyeol’s heart flutter even more than it already was, least of all because of how good Baekhyun looked. To be fair, he always looked good; he seemed to look better and better each time they met. But when he’d opened the door to get into the car earlier, Chanyeol’s jaw had fairly dropped at the sight of him: at the hint of black eyeliner smudged around his eyes, and his blue hair swept up away from his face. He wore tight black jeans with rips at the knees, and a pale grey button-up with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, so that his exceptionally nice forearms were on display. Chanyeol had seen Baekhyun shirtless before, of course, but that tiny glimpse of his chest showing through the unbuttoned collar of his shirt was somehow even sexier than seeing everything at once.

“I don’t blame them. I _am_ pretty exciting.” Baekhyun moved his hand away from Chanyeol’s leg and began stroking his hair instead, reaching over to push it up off his forehead. “I really do like the red on you... it’s hot. You’re like a human flame tree."

Chanyeol laughed. "Oh yeah? ' _The flame trees will blind the weary driver'_... I think this is the best — and probably the most conservative — dye job Wendy’s ever blessed me with.” He looked over at Baekhyun with a knowing smile. “And together we make purple.”

Baekhyun leaned across to kiss Chanyeol softly on the lips, resting one hand on the side of his face. "Well maybe, if you're lucky, we can make purple tonight," he whispered. He opened the car door, winking at Chanyeol over his shoulder before hopping out. Chanyeol followed him over to the restaurant, loosening his shirt collar and feeling like the temperature had suddenly increased by several degrees, even though it was a cool spring night in the low twenties.

 

Minseok and Sehun were already there when they arrived; Chanyeol half-expected his two best friends to jump all over Baekhyun and bombard him with intrusive questions as soon as he sat down, but to his relief, they didn't. They introduced themselves very politely — perhaps even a little too politely, Chanyeol thought. Baekhyun smiled as he shook both their hands in turn. "Chanyeol was right, I totally recognise you two,” he said, with a smile so bright it could put the midday sun to shame.

While they were eating, Minseok said to Baekhyun, “so how did you two actually start dating? Did Yeol get one look at you when you came to deliver his food and ask if he could add you to his order?"

Baekhyun laughed at that. “No, not quite… we'd actually already met each other once before." His eyes briefly met Chanyeol’s and he smiled. "While Yeol was doing one of his rounds in the van, he drove past me in the street. I wasn't having a good day, and he offered me a Gaytime to cheer me up." When Sehun's eyebrows shot up at this information, he laughed again and added, "I'm referring to the ice cream, of course."

"And I thought he was the most beautiful creature on the planet, so naturally I started flirting with him," Chanyeol said, taking over the storytelling to give Baekhyun a rest. "But he looked upset about something, and I thought it'd be in bad taste to ask him out right then and there, even though I really wanted to. So I let it go. I definitely didn't expect him to crash his scooter into a row of bins out the front of my building only a week later." He looked over at Baekhyun fondly, wrapping one arm around his shoulders to pull him closer, and pressed a noisy kiss against his brow. "He also got my order slightly wrong, I might add, but he's such a babe that I had no choice but to forgive him. And now we've been joined at the hip and the mouth ever since."

"Aww. Look how gag-worthy you two already are,” Minseok said good-naturedly; he was beaming smugly at the pair of them, as though he’d orchestrated the whole thing himself. “It’s a very cute story. Isn't it nice when things just seem like they're, hmm, I dunno… meant to be?" He picked up a piece of pork belly from the grill with his chopsticks, wrapping it up in a lettuce leaf. Instead of eating it, he waved it in front of Sehun's face.

"I can feed myself, you know,” Sehun muttered, rolling his eyes, but he smiled and accepted the offering anyway. “So tell me,” he said, turning to Baekhyun. "What makes you want to date this big old dork?”

Chanyeol's smile began to fade. "Who are you calling a big old dork..?”

“In Chanyeol’s defence, I happen to be quite fond of dorks,” Baekhyun said. His expression turned playful, and he added, in a slightly lowered voice, "but if he’s a complete wackjob then you should probably tell me now, before I get too emotionally invested.”

“He _is_ a wackjob, but only mildly. And he’ll definitely treat you right," Sehun replied. He then had the audacity to look surprised when Chanyeol aimed a gentle kick at his leg under the table. “What? I was being nice."

 

In the end, Baekhyun got along surprisingly well with Sehun and Minseok, almost like he'd known them for years, and Chanyeol couldn't help sneaking proud glances at him all the way through dinner. Minseok met Chanyeol's eyes a couple of times over the course of the evening, giving him a look that Chanyeol could only interpret as one of approval. Sehun, meanwhile, was a little less subtle in his methods — announcing that he approved of Baekhyun while he was sitting right there at the table with them, and Baekhyun, easygoing as he was, just laughed it off. “Well, I’m glad you feel that way, Sehun,” he said; he turned to look at Chanyeol, smiling like they shared a secret, and then he slid his hand over the top of Chanyeol's under the table, squeezing it gently. It made Chanyeol want to kiss him really badly, but he didn't; he figured he’d spare his friends any public displays of affection, and contented himself with secretly holding Baekhyun's hand instead.

“Tonight was really fun. I liked your friends a lot,” Baekhyun said while Chanyeol was driving him back to his place afterwards. He patted his tummy over the top of his shirt and let out a big, satisfied sigh. “I ate way too much, though. If you weren’t driving me home I’d probably have to roll myself there.”

"I happen to have it on good authority that my friends liked you too,” Chanyeol replied. “But then you _are_ very likeable, so I expected as much." At the next red light, he gave Baekhyun's hand a quick squeeze, linking their fingers together briefly until it was time to move again.

"Mmm, I hope so… look, it's your song." Now Flame Trees was playing on the radio, and Baekhyun reached across to turn up the volume, singing softly to himself in between sprinklings of conversation. He always seemed to be seconds away from bursting into song, Chanyeol thought. It made him smile every single time.

“Do you know those songs that make you feel kind of exposed whenever you hear them?” Baekhyun was still humming softly to himself; he was facing away from Chanyeol now, his head turned towards the window. “You almost can’t listen to them while you’re out in public... because you know that if you do, and anyone looks at you, then they’re going to see every single thing that song is making you feel, right there in your eyes. There’s no way you’ll be able to hide it.”

“Yeah," Chanyeol said, “I think I know what you mean.” He could vaguely remember feeling the same way about certain songs in the past, even if he couldn't recall what any of them were at that moment.

Baekhyun nodded, looking over at him again. “Well, that’s how I feel about this song,” he said quietly, and then he turned his head back to face the window. His eyes seemed brighter, almost like they were wet, but he looked away before Chanyeol had the time to be sure. He really was a puzzle, that boy; one that Chanyeol could tell he was going to be stuck on for a long time. But that only made the thought of trying to piece him together all the more intriguing.

When they pulled up out the front of Baekhyun's place, Baekhyun was quiet for a second or two, looking down at his hands resting in his lap, and then he said, “do you want to come up? I’m pretty sure my roommate told me he wouldn’t be home tonight.”

Chanyeol raised an eyebrow. “Would it matter if he was?"

“Well, I was gonna ask if you wanted to stay over.” Baekhyun began to fiddle with the hem of his shirt, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger. “But you don’t have to, if you don’t want.” 

Chanyeol watched him continue to fidget in silence. “How about you come back to my place instead? Since there’s never anyone there but me.” He paused to swallow, adding, “no chance of being interrupted, I guess.”

Baekhyun looked up at Chanyeol with his bottom lip caught between his teeth, his expression thoughtful. “Okay,” he said quietly, "just let me go grab my toothbrush and all that."

"Sure. I'll wait here."

Baekhyun got out of the car, closing the door behind him. A second later, he opened it again. "You can come too, if you want."

Chanyeol nodded. "Alright,” he said quietly.

Though Baekhyun had hung out at his place a couple of times by then, Chanyeol had never been up to Baekhyun's apartment before. It looked like any other apartment inhabited by two young men; it was untidy, although not in an off-putting way, just in the sense that it looked well lived in. There was a lot of crap lying around; a grey hoodie draped over the back of the couch, books stacked haphazardly on the coffee table alongside coffee mugs and half-empty glasses of water. There were several pairs of shoes by the door, and a mess of gaming consoles and their tangled cables on the floor in front of the TV.

"Should I just sit down here and wait?" Chanyeol asked, gesturing at the couch as they walked past the living room.

"Nah," Baekhyun said, grabbing him by the wrist and pulling him down the corridor. "Come with me. Keep me company."

Chanyeol followed him — or was dragged along, rather — to his bedroom, where, at Baekhyun's suggestion, he sat down on the chair in front of his desk. Baekhyun's room was neater than the rest of the apartment, and smelled pleasantly of the cologne he usually wore. Apart from the desk, a bed, a bookshelf and a closet built into the wall, there wasn't much in there. The bed was impeccably made, and Chanyeol remembered that he hadn't made his own bed that morning, or for the past couple of mornings — not only that, but he'd just invited Baekhyun to stay at his place, without even thinking that it might have been a good idea to tidy up first. He usually tried to at least make his bed every morning; it felt like if he could accomplish this one small thing as his first task for the day, then somehow the bigger things would eventually take care of themselves. But it had been a restless couple of nights; what little sleep there was had been slashed into by bad dreams, the kind where he woke up in great, heaving sobs without knowing why, and even making his bed felt like it was too much for him at the moment. 

To distract himself from these helpless feelings, Chanyeol kept his mind occupied by continuing to look around Baekhyun's room. Against one wall stood a tall, narrow bookshelf crammed full of books, and he scanned them with his eyes for titles he recognised. He liked to read too, when he had the time, although apparently not to the same extent that Baekhyun did; the bookshelf was so full that he had begun to stack more books horizontally over the top of the vertical ones.

_"The English Patient_ ," Chanyeol murmured, reading the title from one of the spines. “I read that a few years ago. It’s very good.”

Baekhyun stopped rummaging around in one of his closet drawers, and turned around to smile at Chanyeol, however briefly. "Really? It's one of my favourites… I even cried the first time I read it. And then I watched the movie and cried all over again.”

"You must really love books,” Chanyeol said, his eyes still roaming over all the different titles in the shelf. “Have you ever thought about writing them, or is it only reading that you enjoy?”

Baekhyun was quiet for a moment before he replied. “I used to write,” he said. “Just bits and pieces here and there. Actually, I was doing a BA majoring in creative writing at Wollongong uni, but then I deferred. I wasn't in the right headspace for it, I guess. I'm still not sure about whether I'm gonna go back, but I have some time left to think about it.”

"Oh," Chanyeol said, because he didn't know what else to say. "Well, I'm sure you'll figure it out."

"I suppose so. The bookshop is a good fit for me, at least for now. You can probably tell I'm making very good use of my employee discount, hey… I just love the smell of a real book, and the feel of the paper beneath my fingers. I have one of those Kindle thingies too, but it doesn’t really compare." Baekhyun slid the door of the closet across, and Chanyeol could see him smiling to himself in the mirror. "Maybe I'll look into being a librarian or something instead, if I end up giving up on the writing dream altogether."

“All the district libraries advertise their job openings through the council website," Chanyeol said. "I can put in a good word for you if you want. Just in case they're ever looking for an assistant or something."

“Oh really?” Baekhyun turned away from the mirror, directing the full power of his beautiful smile at Chanyeol instead. "That would be great. My Sunny Sunflower… always so thoughtful.” From any other person it might have sounded condescending, but Chanyeol enjoyed being on the receiving end of Baekhyun's praise. He could tell that Baekhyun meant every word he said.

"Right. I'll just grab my toothbrush and then we can leave." Almost as soon as he left the room, Baekhyun stuck his head back in the door. "Do you have condoms and shit over at your place, or should I bring some?" He didn't even flinch about asking. After that night they spent in Chanyeol's car, he had slowed down his advances somewhat, and so all they'd done over the past few weeks was kiss and cuddle and touch each other a bit; but evidently there was something more than making out on Baekhyun's mind tonight, and the thought made Chanyeol's stomach drop a little. A part of him had been expecting as much, but it didn’t make his heartbeat any calmer.

He swallowed before he spoke. "It's okay... I bought some recently. Just in case."

"Did you, now.” Baekhyun wiggled his eyebrows. “I like a man who plans ahead."

Chanyeol laughed nervously, hoping he wasn't blushing all the way up to his hairline, though it felt like he probably was. "Yeah, well. It's always good to be prepared."

Baekhyun disappeared into the bathroom to get his toothbrush, and returned a moment later with his overnight bag hanging off his shoulder. "Okay," he said, "let's go." Chanyeol’s stomach lurched again, but he said nothing. He wouldn’t have been all that nervous about someone coming to stay the night, not usually... but Baekhyun was different. Baekhyun was different, and he was beautiful, and he was the real deal, and Chanyeol felt a little lightheaded for the entirety of the thankfully short drive over to his place. 

When they got there, Baekhyun didn't seem to notice that Chanyeol’s apartment was messier than usual; if he did, he didn't mention it. He politely declined any offers of refreshments, and so Chanyeol let him use the bathroom before going in there himself. When he was done, he found Baekhyun standing in the middle of his bedroom, wearing a loose grey t-shirt that was so long it almost completely covered his blue checked boxer shorts. He was staring at Chanyeol’s unmade bed with the pile of clothes tossed carelessly over the foot of it, looking adorably lost. Chanyeol cringed at how disorderly his room was, but he hadn't exactly planned to bring Baekhyun back to his place. He could usually equate the current state of his mind with the current state of his apartment; he wondered if Baekhyun could tell this about him, just by looking at it.

Baekhyun looked slightly taken aback when he noticed Chanyeol watching him so intently. "What's that look for?" he asked quietly.

“Nothing, really. Are you okay?” Chanyeol remained in the doorway; he leaned against the frame with his arms folded in front of him, just letting himself take in the sight of Baekhyun standing there — in his bedroom, in the flesh.

“Yeah," Baekhyun said. "Why wouldn’t I be?"

Chanyeol just shrugged. Now Baekhyun was looking at him expectantly, like he wanted him to say something, and he had to smile at how cute he looked. Cute and a little bit shy. It was rare to see him like that, but there was something very sweet about it. "I don’t know,” he said, "just asking.” He walked into the room, pulled his own shirt over his head and draped it across the chair in the corner. He dropped his pants, leaving his underwear on, though he let them sit a little lower around his hips; a bit of a tease wouldn’t hurt. He could tell from the way Baekhyun looked at him that he was trying hard to hold on to his neutral expression; from the way he stood there with his eyes glued to Chanyeol’s body and his lower lip sucked into his mouth, it seemed like he was enjoying the view.

Chanyeol walked over to his bed, dumping the pile of clothes on the floor, then threw the covers aside and hopped in, one leg first and then the other. "You coming?" He pushed the covers down further and patted the mattress next to him, grinning at Baekhyun. “I’ve saved you the best seat in the house.”

Baekhyun rewarded him with a roll of his eyes and a gentle smile. He slid beneath the sheets next to Chanyeol, sitting up straight with his hands folded neatly on top of the doona. “Kinda feels like we're an old married couple, hey."

Chanyeol snorted so hard that it felt like he might burst something vital. “You can lie down, you know.” He lay down flat with his hands resting behind his head, hoping Baekhyun might follow his lead if he did, instead of sitting there looking so stiff. Now that he could see Baekhyun was nervous too, it made him feel a little more confident. “Relax. And come a bit closer, if you like. I’m not gonna try anything unless you want me to.”

Slowly, Baekhyun lowered himself onto the bed until he was also lying flat. “Isn’t that kinda why I’m here?"

“It doesn’t have to be. I didn’t invite you here specifically for that reason.” Chanyeol reached over to hold Baekhyun’s hand, circling his thumb over the back of it. "We can cuddle, if you want,” he said, after a moment’s silence. “We can kiss. We can even just... talk.” As soon as the words left his mouth, he felt dumb for saying them; it seemed doubtful that Baekhyun would have come here just to talk to him. "I really like talking to you, that's all. It’s nice to have someone to talk to at the end of the day. I haven’t really had that in a while.”

Baekhyun rolled on his side to face Chanyeol, scooting over a little closer. Their hands remained joined on the bed between them. “Don’t you talk to Minseok, or Sehun? Or your other friends?"

“Minseok and Sehun have each other,” Chanyeol said quietly. “As for my other friends... it’s not quite the same thing, and I don't have that many other friends to begin with. Not close ones, anyway."

"Minseok and Sehun seem like really nice guys," Baekhyun said. "And they love you, too — especially Minseok. I can tell."

"What makes you say that..?" Chanyeol asked, looking over at him curiously.

“While you were outside having a smoke with Sehun, he was talking to me about you," Baekhyun said. He rolled onto his back, looking up at the ceiling. “He said you’re somehow both the smartest and the dopiest person he knows, all at the same time.” He laughed softly, and then he was quiet for a moment. “He also said that you have a beautiful heart, and that if anyone was going to make me happy, it would be you. And then he asked me to take care of it because he knew you’d been hurt before, very badly.”

Chanyeol raised himself up to lean on one elbow. “He said that..?” _Best Wingman Award goes to Minseok Kim_. “That’s... nice of him.”

Baekhyun nodded. He turned his head to smile at Chanyeol. “He did. And I told him that I would.”

Chanyeol opened his mouth to say something, and then closed it again.

“You know, I don’t really feel like talking right now,” Baekhyun said, his voice lowered to a whisper. “Is that alright..?”

“Yeah. That’s—” Chanyeol began, and the rest of his sentence was lost in Baekhyun’s mouth pressed against his. “—Perfectly fine.”

Baekhyun rolled on top of Chanyeol, still kissing him. “Sorry,” he whispered, “I hope this is okay.”  Chanyeol loved the warmth and the weight of him. His hands moved up to settle on Baekhyun's hips, holding him in place. 

"It is,” he said. "It's more than okay. You know I love kissing you.” Baekhyun just smiled at him, and then began to kiss him again, with such fervour that it was hard to get any other words out, but Chanyeol wasn’t about to complain. It made him think of the way one might kiss a lover they weren’t going to see for a long time. A familiar, wistful feeling washed over him, like he was missing something again; the feeling that something, or someone, had been left behind. Baekhyun's fingers were cold, his hands moving over Chanyeol's shoulders and down along his arms. It made him shiver a little, but it felt good.

Baekhyun stopped kissing him then, pausing to trace the sunflower on Chanyeol's chest with his fingertips. He looked pensive, studying the tattoo with his head tilted to one side. “Did it hurt a lot? It looks like it would’ve.”

Chanyeol placed his hand on top of Baekhyun’s, holding it against his sternum. “You have no idea. I seriously thought I was gonna faint for every minute I spent in that chair,” he whispered, smiling. His gaze dropped from Baekhyun’s eyes to his lips. “But it was worth it."

"It really is incredible. So lifelike." Baekhyun traced the delicate linework of the tattoo, slowly and carefully, redrawing the sunflower with his finger. He then lowered his head to kiss each of the petals in turn, the first contact of his lips with Chanyeol's skin so unexpected as to make him draw a sharp breath, but he recovered quickly. He moved his hand to the back of Baekhyun’s head, burying his fingers in his hair, and closed his eyes, releasing a deep sigh of contentment. 

Baekhyun rested his head upon Chanyeol's chest for a moment, his ear pressed to the sunflower's centre. "I can hear you in there," he whispered. "I'll take care of you, okay?"

Chanyeol smiled to himself, but didn't open his eyes. "Who are you talking to..?”

“Your heart," Baekhyun murmured; he kissed the sunflower one more time and lifted his head, leaning forward to kiss Chanyeol on the lips, breathing a hushed _“I want you”_ into his mouth. 

Chanyeol's hands moved along the sides of Baekhyun's body, slipping beneath his t-shirt to push it upwards, rubbing circles into his back. His hands wandered downwards again, over Baekhyun’s hips; he slid the boxers down halfway over Baekhyun’s bum and gave it a little squeeze at the same time, loving the resulting little gasp for air that he earned for his trouble. Chanyeol couldn’t stop kissing him; the more skin he uncovered, the more he couldn’t keep himself away — from Baekhyun’s lips, his hands, his body. It made him feel hungry in a way he had never been before. He rolled over so that Baekhyun lay beneath him, and together they removed the rest of their clothes, barely pausing to breathe between kisses. Finally Chanyeol relieved Baekhyun of the boxers, his very last stitch of clothing, and for a moment he just lay there next to him, taking it all in — the sight of the most beautiful boy he'd ever seen, lying naked in his bed. _Have I hit the fucking jackpot or what?_

"What?" Baekhyun looked shy under Chanyeol's gaze, but he didn't try to hide himself. 

"Nothing,” Chanyeol said. He lifted a hand to touch Baekhyun's face, whispering “you’re just really sexy” in a voice so quiet he almost couldn’t hear himself speak. A little smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. He gave in and let it grow into a grin.

Baekhyun turned his head to kiss the palm of Chanyeol’s hand. “Like what you see, huh?”

"Yeah." Chanyeol allowed himself another slow and deliberate once-over of Baekhyun’s body, and tried to hold back another smile by biting his lip — not that it worked. "Fuck yeah...”

“Yeah? Well, you’re not so bad yourself.“ Baekhyun was smiling now too, and Chanyeol could feel it lingering there on his lips when they kissed again.

“Only ‘not bad’..?” Affecting a pout, he pinned Baekhyun down flat against the bed, kissing and nuzzling his neck. “I was hoping I'd score a little higher than that.”

“You know I think you’re gorgeous, Sunflower. Now, if you don't mind, I'm really in the mood to make some purple.” Baekhyun laughed at his own silly euphemism, but the laughter quickly turned into a moan when Chanyeol’s hands began exploring him again. His own hands trembled against Chanyeol's face, then moved down to his shoulders and over his back, his fingers tracing the dip of Chanyeol's spine. Even if he tried to play it cool, hiding his shyness behind humour, Chanyeol could still see the apprehension in his eyes.

He took one of Baekhyun's hands, linking their fingers together, and kissed the back of it. “Hey… I’ll go slow, okay? If it doesn’t feel good, just tell me.”

Baekhyun nodded. "Okay,” he whispered, and Chanyeol did his best to be gentle, starting off so slowly that he wondered if Baekhyun would end up being bored. But he seemed to be in no rush; he moved his body to match Chanyeol's unhurried rhythm, begging to be touched and kissed with nothing more than that look in his eyes, and Chanyeol couldn't help but give him whatever he wanted. The only language left to him was one that he had to learn to interpret on the spot: the quiet sighs, the stuttered breaths, the tilt of Baekhyun’s head against the pillow; the bite of his lip, his fluttering eyelids, the softly-uttered _yes_ when Chanyeol kissed his neck, gently nipping the flesh with his teeth — enough to make Baekhyun’s breath catch in his throat, but not enough to hurt him.

"How does that feel?" Chanyeol asked, now mouthing a trail of kisses along Baekhyun's shoulder. "Too slow..?”

“No, I like it slow," Baekhyun whispered. He rolled his head back further and breathed out deeply through his nose, trying to relax. "Slow feels good."

“Alright. Just slap me on the bum or something, if you want me to go faster."

“What are you, a horse? Do I need to get my whip out?” Baekhyun said drily, with a little snort of derision. He licked his lips, looking up at Chanyeol through half-closed eyes. There was that little smile again. “Or I could just open my bloody mouth and say 'faster’…”

Chanyeol laughed softly. "Alright, smart-arse.” He kissed Baekhyun again to shut him up, and it worked. It mightn't work for long, he thought, so he kept doing it, and Baekhyun let him. There was something comforting, almost familiar, about being with him: the slow sweetness of his kisses, his tongue moving languidly like warm honey in Chanyeol's mouth. The way his hands sought out all the places Chanyeol loved to be touched, as though he had known them all along. It felt good — so good — and Chanyeol didn't know how much longer he would hold out. He could tell from Baekhyun’s breathing that he wasn't far off, either.

Baekhyun lifted his head up to say something then, his lips brushing against Chanyeol’s ear. "You should hum the tune to Greensleeves," he whispered, "so I know you're coming."

Chanyeol had to stop for a moment, stifling the unavoidable burst of laughter by burying his face against Baekhyun's neck. “Wow. Thanks a lot, you mood-wrecker.”

"Sorry. Couldn’t help myself.” Baekhyun had one hand on the back of Chanyeol’s head, his fingers sliding through his hair. Now he was laughing too, his whole body shaking with it, which only set Chanyeol off again. 

"Stop cracking me up!” He collapsed on top of Baekhyun's body, too weak with laughter to hold himself up. “Fuck. We were so close, too."

"Aww, don't be mad.” Baekhyun gave Chanyeol’s bum a light slap, apparently in a bid to get him moving again. “I knew it would make you laugh. I claim full responsibility for killing your boner. How about a kiss to make up for it?”

Chanyeol eventually gave in, kissing Baekhyun softly on the lips — and then again, but a little less softly. "If I actually did the Greensleeves thing,” he whispered, “would it turn you on..?”

"No, you fuckin weirdo." Baekhyun laughed into the kiss, but soon became too breathless to say anything more. He was the first to let go, with a low moan in Chanyeol's mouth and his fingers curled up in his hair, tugging on it gently. His legs relaxed, releasing their hold on Chanyeol's hips, all the tension in his body melting away. Chanyeol followed soon afterwards with a shudder of pleasure, and rested his head on Baekhyun's chest while he caught his breath. He could feel the thrum of Baekhyun's heart, and he kept his head very still to listen; there was something magical about it, knowing he was the reason for that heart to be beating so hard. They lay there holding each other in silence, their bodies warm and slick with sweat, their heavy breathing the only sound in the room.

When Chanyeol finally lifted his head, Baekhyun had an odd look on his face. It was the same sort of expression he had seen Sehun wearing a couple of times before — usually when he was trying really hard not to cry during Sad Movie Night, an 'event' he and Minseok sometimes hosted at their place. He kissed Baekhyun sloppily on the cheek. “Cheer up... it wasn’t that bad, was it?”

Baekhyun shook his head. His eyes met Chanyeol's, only for a moment, and then they fluttered closed. "No," he said softly, "it was really good.”

“It was. Even though you ruined it a bit by making me laugh.” Chanyeol smiled at the thought, pressing another kiss to Baekhyun's cheekbone. He reached for the container of wet wipes he kept on the nightstand, and after they’d both cleaned up a bit he gathered Baekhyun into his arms again, holding him tight. "Are you sleepy?" he whispered, kissing the back of Baekhyun's neck.

“Mmm. A little.” Baekhyun reached behind him for one of Chanyeol's arms, pulling it tighter around his waist, and Chanyeol immediately began rubbing circles into his tummy. Their legs were all tangled together, and he loved it — loved how close they were, how they were still touching in so many places. Chanyeol was a cuddler, he couldn't help himself; and Baekhyun seemed happy enough to go along with it, so he would take whatever he could get.

“Did you come home with me tonight because you actually wanted to?” he asked, after they’d been quiet for a while. "Or was it because you thought I expected it?”

“Because I wanted to,” Baekhyun said without pause, and he sounded so matter-of-fact about it that Chanyeol could find no reason to doubt him. “I wanted to sleep with you. I wouldn’t give a shit if you expected it or not.” Gently unwinding Chanyeol's arm from around his body, he got up from the bed and made his way towards the door. Chanyeol was worried he'd offended him with the question, but then Baekhyun said, "I'm just going for a piss. I’ll be right back.”

“Okay.” Chanyeol lay there in the dim glow of the lamp beside him, waiting for Baekhyun to return. For a moment he wondered if he would come back at all; there was something of a free spirit about Baekhyun, and walking naked out into the street to do a runner wasn't really something Chanyeol would have put past him. But then he heard the toilet flushing in the background, and Baekhyun’s silhouette reappeared in the doorway. He walked quietly back into the room.

“You alright?” Chanyeol asked.

“Yep.” Still naked, Baekhyun slipped beneath the covers, lying on his side to face Chanyeol. "Are you?"

"Uh huh. I feel great.” With his fingers, Chanyeol brushed Baekhyun's fringe aside to see him better; he had a small indentation high up on his cheekbone, a scar left by a blemish or something similar, and he leaned over to press his lips to it. Whenever he saw some sort of little feature he hadn’t noticed before, he always had an immediate urge to kiss it. “Are you tired? Wanna sleep now?"

“Soon. Just kiss me for a bit longer,” Baekhyun whispered, and Chanyeol kissed him on the mouth, his thumb gently tracing the edge of his jaw. Baekhyun let him do that for a while, then rolled over and lay half on top of him, resting his head on Chanyeol's chest. 

“You know,” he said quietly, his voice slowing down as though he were about to drift off. “When Minseok said your heart had been broken really badly…” He trailed off at the end of the sentence, and for a while Chanyeol thought he really had fallen asleep; but then Baekhyun shifted on top of him, and the friction it caused in a few areas that were still sensitive made Chanyeol swallow down a moan. 

"I don't really talk about it much,” he said in a quiet voice, wrapping his arms more tightly around Baekhyun’s body. “But I haven’t really dated anyone in a long time. Actually... the last guy died several years ago. In an accident.”

Baekhyun was quiet for a while. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered, “I shouldn’t have asked.”

“No… it’s okay. Really.” Chanyeol began to stroke Baekhyun’s hair, hoping the comforting gesture would reassure him that it was fine — he wasn’t upset by the question. “There's not a whole lot I remember about that period of my life. It seems that it was so traumatic for me that I — well, I suppose you could say that I repressed a lot of it.”

“I see,” Baekhyun said. He looked like he wanted to say something, but Chanyeol could tell from the doubtful expression on his face that he wasn’t sure whether he could ask.

“I’ve tried asking my friends and family about what happened in the past,” he continued, “but no one will tell me anything. Everyone just... goes quiet whenever I bring it up, or they say it won’t do me any good to remember; that there’s probably a reason I’ve forced it out of my memory. All I know is that his death was an accident, and that I apparently had nothing to do with it, but that doesn’t do a whole lot to ease my mind. Anyway, do I _really_ know that... or do I just _think_ I know it, because that’s the only thing anyone’s ever told me? It’s hard to tell the difference when I can remember so little on my own.”

Baekhyun lifted his head up from Chanyeol’s chest, looking down at him with a concerned expression. “Does it make you angry?” he asked. “That they refuse to talk to you about it.”

"Not really," Chanyeol said, and then he sighed. "I do see where they're coming from, to a point. They clearly saw how bad it was for me at the time, and so they don’t understand why I would want to put myself through something like that again. Why would I want to relive that kind of pain? But then another part of me wants to know… wants to remember. Not just for me, but for him, as well.” He lay there in silence for a moment, idly stroking Baekhyun’s hair and staring up at the ceiling. “The thing is, I think that parts of it are starting to come back to me. Just little snippets of things I see in my dreams that don't make a whole lot of sense to me right now, but… I just get this very strong feeling that I probably saw him die. And that makes me wonder if it's possible that I was in some way connected to what happened, even if it wasn’t my fault. Even if I don't remember how, or why… I’m sorry, this is pretty heavy for bedtime conversation, isn’t it?”

Baekhyun shook his head. “I’m really happy that you trust me enough to tell me something like this,” he said.

“Of course I trust you,” Chanyeol whispered. He began to stroke Baekhyun’s hair again, and yawned generously. “But I think I’ve said enough about it for now. Should we sleep?"

Baekhyun answered with a yawn of his own, and it muffled half of his reply. “Maybe. Can I sleep here?”

Chanyeol made a groaning sound, pretending that Baekhyun was crushing him beneath his weight. He laughed when Baekhyun lifted his head up to shoot him an unamused look. “You mean in my bed, or on top of me?"

"Both," Baekhyun said. He returned his head to Chanyeol’s chest. Now his breathing was slower, and he sounded like he might nod off at any moment.

"Of course, babe.” Chanyeol paused for a moment, wondering if this was a misstep. "Can I call you babe?”

"You can call me anything you like,” Baekhyun whispered, "I don’t mind.” He smiled and added, “ _babe_.” Even if he only meant it as a joke, Chanyeol still glowed with happiness at hearing Baekhyun call him that. 

“Alright.” He yawned again, already exhausted, but he had a feeling that sleep was still a way off for him. "I can call you anything, huh?”

"Well, maybe not 'shithead’. But I guess it depends on the context."

Chanyeol laughed softly. "Noted.” He continued to comb his fingers through Baekhyun's hair until he heard his breathing slow right down, a sure sign that he was asleep.

 

Sleep didn’t come to Chanyeol quite that easily, even with Baekhyun lying so close to him. Despite this, he didn’t mind Baekhyun's weight on top of him, or the extra body heat; even in his own sleeplessness, Baekhyun’s presence was still a great comfort, and holding him tight while he slept was a welcome distraction. At last he drifted off too, and woke up the next day with a heaving chest, and that familiar feeling of bone-crushing grief, but there were no tears in his eyes this time. When he calmed down, he saw that Baekhyun was asleep, nestled beside him but with his head still resting on his chest. One of his arms was curled around Chanyeol’s waist. His breathing was shallow but even, and Chanyeol felt the warmth of it on his skin. All he could see when he looked down was the top of Baekhyun's head, the traces of blue hair dye on his scalp visible through the parting of his hair. The petals of the sunflower tattoo poked out from beneath his head, like a little halo. He was a cuddler too, as Chanyeol was happy to learn; it seemed that he needed to hold someone, or something, while he slept. Chanyeol vaguely remembered getting up once in the night to go to the toilet, returning to find Baekhyun hugging his pillow instead, and had to gently wrestle it away from him without waking him up.

Eventually Baekhyun began to stir, rolling away from Chanyeol's body and onto the bed. He was still half asleep, as far as Chanyeol could tell; the way he arched his back against the mattress, biting his lip and letting out a deep, shuddering breath made Chanyeol wonder if he was waking up from a sexy dream. Then he saw the tent Baekhyun had erected beneath the sheet, which seemed to confirm this suspicion, and chuckled softly to himself.

At last Baekhyun opened his eyes and saw Chanyeol staring at him. His face went a bit pink, but he smiled. "Hey,” he whispered, "aren’t you a pretty sight to wake up to..."

“Morning, beautiful,” Chanyeol whispered back, returning the smile. “Nice dream?”

Baekhyun lifted a hand and curled it into a fist, using it to rub one of his eyes. "Hmm? Oh... I don't remember.” ( _Sure_ , Chanyeol thought smugly.) “But it was a really good sleep. Best I've had in ages."

Chanyeol laughed softly and kissed the top of Baekhyun's head through his hair. "I'll bet it was… you don't have to go anywhere, by the way. Stay as long as you like."

"Forever..?” Baekhyun bit his lip, apparently to hold back a smile. He was probably joking, but Chanyeol hoped there was at least a tiny bit of truth to it.

"I wouldn't say no,” he said. He didn't bother trying to hide the fact that he was now grinning like an idiot.

“Kiss me, then.” Baekhyun traced his fingertips up and down over Chanyeol’s arm, teasing him, until Chanyeol finally gave in and rolled on top of him, kissing him slowly.

“You really are the sexiest thing I've ever laid eyes on,” he whispered, moving down to leave a sprinkling of kisses over Baekhyun’s chest and stomach.

 Baekhyun curled his fingers up in Chanyeol’s hair with a happy sigh. "Sunflower, my sweet,” he said, while Chanyeol was busy kissing the part of his tummy just beneath his navel, where it was the softest. "I think you might’ve really grown on me. What the hell am I gonna do now?” He said this in a hushed voice, like he was confessing his gravest sin.

Chanyeol laughed softly into Baekhyun’s skin, then gave his belly a playful little bite, making him squirm. "Well, that's okay,” he whispered, “that's not a bad thing at all.” Inside his chest, his heart was singing. 

They held each other and kissed for a while longer; it was Saturday morning, anyway, and Chanyeol had nowhere to be. Nowhere better than where he was, lying in his own bed and wrapped up in Baekhyun’s arms. Baekhyun seemed to have more confidence than before, showing him where and how he liked to be touched, and doing the same for him; it was sexy, and Chanyeol loved every second of it. He couldn’t remember the last time he felt this good — and this comfortable — around someone else. At one point he rolled Baekhyun over to kiss all the way down his back, and found another tiny mole high up on the back of his thigh, just beneath the curve of his bum. “You have a mole here, too,” he whispered, leaving a light kiss over the top of it. “So cute.”

Baekhyun squirmed a little beneath him. “Yeah, I know. That’s my Gosford mole.”

“Your Gosford mole..?”

“Uh-huh. Because Gosford is near The Entrance, and so is my mole. You get it?”

Chanyeol laughed at that. “I get it.” He kissed the tiny mole again. “I really like your Gosford mole.”

“When I was a kid, we used to drive up to The Entrance for our summer holidays every couple of years, for a change of scenery,” Baekhyun said in a soft and sleepy voice. “They had the best waterslide park up there, much better than the shitty little one we had at Nowra. Although I think it’s been upgraded since then, so maybe it’s better now. I don’t know.”

“Slipping and sliding in The Entrance, huh,” Chanyeol mused. “Sounds like fun.”

“It was — a _lot_ of fun. My brother and I always had the best time there, but then they dismantled all the slides. I think they were starting to get too old and rundown to be safe anymore, and the park just couldn’t maintain them properly. Such a bummer.”

“A huge bummer,” Chanyeol agreed, poking Baekhyun’s bum for good measure. “Well, there’s always our old mate Jamberoo. And it’s a lot closer.”

“I know… but somehow Jamberoo wasn’t as fun. The other park just always remained really good in my memory. If I had a chance to go back down those slides now, though, maybe I’d think they were crap. But the memory constantly updates itself; it stays fresh and exciting, you know? So things just seem way better than they probably were.” Baekhyun rolled over onto his back, and then he was quiet for a moment. “I suppose that’s the lure of nostalgia, but also the flip-side of it. It rips you out of the present. We’re good at that, I think… dwelling on how good things were, and forgetting about how good they _could_ be, if we only paid more attention to what’s going on right now.”

Chanyeol didn’t know who the ‘we’ was that Baekhyun referred to, but figured he was probably speaking generally. “Yeah. A little bit of reminiscing is okay, though,” he said quietly, and then he leaned in to press another kiss to the top of Baekhyun’s head through his hair. He would have liked to remember sharing tender moments like this one with Kris, but he couldn’t remember anything like that. He couldn’t remember anything at all.

 

Finally they got out of bed and showered together, sharing a few steamy kisses under the warm spray. The fine line between tenderly washing each other and brazenly feeling each other up was trodden — and crossed — many times. A little later when Baekhyun was in the middle of getting dressed, Chanyeol watched him quietly from where he lay on the bed, still naked and wrapped in his damp towel. He was twisting a section of the towel into a tight little knot, to match the one in his gut. 

“I know it might be too soon to ask,” he said, breaking the silence at last, “but if we end up dating for a bit longer, would you consider possibly moving in with me?”

Baekhyun glanced over at Chanyeol from where he stood, threading the tail of his belt through his jeans. He laughed softly and said, "what are you on about? I’m already scoping out where I can put my stuff. Anyway, I think you’d be much nicer to live with than Kyungsoo. He’s a top bloke, don’t get me wrong, but he can be way too precious sometimes.” Chanyeol must have looked dumbfounded at Baekhyun’s response, because he laughed again. “Sorry, was that too fast for you..?”

Chanyeol shook his head. “No, not at all… I just wasn’t expecting you to feel that way. At least, not yet.”

“Well, expect the unexpected,” Baekhyun said, pretending to be all cryptic and mysterious. He looked coyly over his shoulder at Chanyeol before walking out of the bedroom, and then a second later he walked back into it again. “I forgot that I don’t have Buzz with me... would you be able to drop me off at home? I have to be at the bookshop by eleven.”

Chanyeol nodded, trying not to laugh, and rolled off the bed to find himself some clothes. “Yeah, of course.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playlist for Chapter 4:  
> 1\. [Into My Arms - Little Birdy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qahWK1RNFqc)  
> 2\. [Flame Trees - Cold Chisel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8KgP2aOXcA)  
> 3\. [Falling All Around You - The Coral](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UusiuZJC1PU)  
> 4\. [Like Real People Do - Hozier](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrleydRwWms)  
> 5\. [The Ship Song - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4VWKbZkIcM)


	5. One Eye Open

 

 

_________________________________

 

_October 30th_

_I never fully understood the meaning of ‘domestic bliss’ until the first time I walked past the living room and saw you reading on the couch — lying on your back with your legs up on the armrest, wearing that adorable little frown of concentration. Now whenever I see you doing that, I always get the most incredible urge to grab you and kiss you, even though you’d probably throw your book at me if I tried._

_(Next time I swear I’ll do it, but only if it’s a paperback.)_

 

_________________________________

 

 

 

Baekhyun leaned up against the back of Chanyeol’s shoulder, gently biting his ear to wake him. “Wakey wakey,” he whispered.

The sunlight pouring in through the blinds made Chanyeol scrunch up his nose. He rubbed his eyes and rolled over, lying flat on his back. “Hands on snakey…?” he said, his voice still croaky with sleep.

“I always thought it was 'hands _off_ snakey’… but sure, whatever floats your pickle." Baekhyun looked like he was trying not to laugh; eventually he failed, falling back against the bed in a fit of chuckling. "Man, you crack me up.”

Smiling, Chanyeol turned his head so that they were face to face, close enough that they nearly bumped noses. "Then I've been waking up wrong for a long, long time,” he whispered, and Baekhyun giggled again into his mouth when they kissed for the first time that morning. He’d worn one of Chanyeol’s old band t-shirts to bed, a Silverchair one now made of more holes than cloth, and Chanyeol could see his bellybutton through one of the holes. He reached over to poke it with his finger, making Baekhyun squirm so much he nearly elbowed him between the eyes.

They’d only been living together for a couple of months, but Chanyeol already had trouble remembering what life was like before Baekhyun had moved in with him. Though it took a bit of adjustment at first, he got used to him being around fairly quickly. It was hard not to, especially when there were reminders of him everywhere: his clothes filling up one half of the closet in their bedroom, and all his books crammed into the bookshelf alongside Chanyeol's —  and on top of them, and underneath them as well. Then there was his collection of shampoo and conditioner bottles on the floor of the shower — all of them at varying levels of emptiness — and the fact that the bed always smelled like him. Chanyeol hadn't originally expected the arrangement to work out quite so well, but they complimented each other in different ways. Baekhyun couldn’t cook for shit, but he was very good at keeping the place clean. He willingly took charge of all the things Chanyeol wasn't so keen on, such as grocery shopping, bed-making and the removal of many-legged creatures from the apartment. He ate everything Chanyeol cooked and said it was the best whatever-it-was he’d ever tasted, and Chanyeol always knew that he meant it. 

He looked over at Baekhyun lying beside him now, and felt his chest flooding with warmth. Despite becoming accustomed to Baekhyun's general presence, there were some things Chanyeol still couldn't get used to, like waking up next to him every day; sometimes it felt like he always forgot how beautiful Baekhyun was overnight, only to open his eyes the next morning and lose the ability to breathe for a moment. 

With a sleepy little sigh, Baekhyun rolled onto his stomach, and Chanyeol moved over to lie on top of him, using his bum as a pillow. "You have the best bum in the whole entire world,” he said in a soft voice, and he turned his head to kiss it noisily over the top of Baekhyun's pyjama shorts. "I think I’ll write a love song for it. I’ll call it 'Ode to Baekhyun's Bum’.”

Baekhyun laughed. He rested his head upon his folded arms, kicking his feet in the air behind him. "Yeah, yeah. We all know you love my arse more than you love me."

"I only love it because it's attached to you.”

"Sure.” Baekhyun pushed out a fart then, right in Chanyeol’s ear. It was loud, but thankfully it didn't stink. "Did you love that as well?”

“Not so much,” Chanyeol said, wrinkling his nose, though he didn't move his head away.

Baekhyun rolled over again, making Chanyeol's head fall off his bum and back onto the bed. “Come on,” he said, and with both arms wrapped around Chanyeol's middle, he began to haul him upwards. “Get back up here and give me a cuddle. Stop giving my bum all the attention.”

“Okay, I’m sorry.” Chanyeol gave Baekhyun a quick kiss on the lips before moving along to his neck, leaving a trail of kisses down the side of it. _“Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful booooy,”_ he sang, nuzzling against Baekhyun’s skin. “Sometimes I feel like that song was made just for you.”

“Lennon wrote that for his son,” Baekhyun said, rolling his eyes. “I’m not your son.”

“I know. But I can still be your daddy.” 

Baekhyun pushed him away playfully. “Sick,” he said, laughing.

“I know you are,” Chanyeol teased. He held on tight through Baekhyun’s attempts to shove him off, and continued to whisper sweet bits of nonsense into his ear. “Baby… cutie… sexbomb hotpants...”

Baekhyun laughed again. "Sexbomb hotpants, huh. There’s one I haven’t heard before.”

“What can I say? I’m feeling very inspired at the moment.” Chanyeol pressed another soft kiss against Baekhyun’s neck and smiled.

“Fair enough. You can’t call me Sunflower, though, because I’ve got exclusive rights to that one."

“That’s fine. You’re not tall enough to be a sunflower, anyway." As soon as Chanyeol said this, he copped a pinch on the thigh for his insolence, but it didn’t hurt much.

Baekhyun turned his head and murmured “love you” into Chanyeol's hair, pushing it away from his eyes. It had grown out a little, and was now dyed back to a very ordinary dark brown. Wendy had started conning other people into letting her experiment on them, and so she no longer relied so heavily on Chanyeol as a hair model; Baekhyun was one of those people she'd recently 'recruited', and currently his hair was a bright turquoise that Chanyeol loved. It reminded him of how blue and clear the water had been on that day they first went to the beach together.

“I really want you… but I don’t think we have the time.” Baekhyun leaned forward to kiss him again — chastely at first, and then a little less so, his tongue slowly tracing the seam of Chanyeol’s lips until they parted for him. “My pretty baby,” he whispered into Chanyeol's open mouth, and then he rolled on top of him, kissing him harder. They kissed lazily for a few more minutes until Baekhyun’s second and third alarm went off, and then they dragged themselves out of bed to go their separate ways for the day. Baekhyun had recently landed a job as a library assistant, and had given up his part-time delivery gig at Noodle Palace, though he still did the odd weekend shift at the bookshop. He seemed to enjoy the new job, often filling Chanyeol in on all the fun little happenings of working in a public library: the strange, amusing, and occasionally tormented scrawls he found in the margins of some of the books while he was shelving them, and the random objects people were always dropping into the returns chute — perhaps an old shoe one day, a banana peel the next. Chanyeol’s favourite story was the time Baekhyun had found the head of a garden gnome in there — no body, just the head. Just thinking about it made him laugh.

 

With Baekhyun in his life, Chanyeol found he was happier overall, even if he still wasn’t sleeping well. He had hoped when they first started living together that having someone to sleep next to might make things a bit easier in that department. He loved sharing a bed with Baekhyun, and waking up in his arms every morning, but there were still those dreaded nights when the time he spent just lying there awake could drag on for a lifetime. When he did sleep, he often had those same recurring, unsettling dreams that were too vague to be considered nightmares; and yet there was something about them that haunted him, a sinister feeling he couldn't shake. Usually Baekhyun slept through his tossing and turning, but sometimes he woke up and held him through it; there were times when Chanyeol would awaken to Baekhyun humming in his ear, quietly singing bits and pieces of the same Korean folk songs that Chanyeol's mother used to sing to him when he was little. 

“Do you miss him?” Baekhyun asked one night while they were holding each other in bed, as they always did before going to sleep. There was no need to clarify; they both knew who he was talking about.

Chanyeol leaned forward, brushing his lips against Baekhyun’s forehead. He didn’t want to say that he didn’t really miss him that much — mainly because he barely even remembered him. That would have sounded heartless. “I guess I do… sometimes. But I'm really happy with you,” he said. “There are times when I feel so happy I don't even know what to do with myself."

“Mmm. Me too, babe.” Baekhyun rolled over onto his side and pulled Chanyeol against him, kissing the back of his neck. “Should I tell you all about my day at the library, then?

“Sure,” Chanyeol said. Baekhyun whispering in his ear while he spooned him was automatically his idea of heaven, regardless of what he talked about.

“Okay. Well today, some thoughtful individual dropped a dog shit into the returns slot." Baekhyun laughed softly as he kissed Chanyeol’s ear, and then began nibbling on it gently. “At least, I _think_ it came from a dog…”

“Seriously?” Chanyeol shuddered — both from the revolting mental image this conjured up, and from the feeling of Baekhyun’s warm mouth on his ear. “People are fucked.”

“I know... but at least it was inside a plastic bag. Made the whole removal operation slightly less disgusting.” Pushing Chanyeol’s old t-shirt aside, Baekhyun started a trail of soft kisses along his shoulder instead; at the same time, his fingers skimmed up and down over the bare skin of Chanyeol’s arm, just barely touching him, which gave him goosebumps. “Anyway, it landed right on a copy of Fifty Shades of Grey that someone had returned. How apt.”

Chanyeol laughed at that. “How apt indeed.”

“Mm-hmm,” Baekhyun hummed in reply; he pushed Chanyeol down flat on the bed and rolled on top of him, kissing him softly on the lips. “So I was helping a kid look up animal facts for a school project in the afternoon… and did you know that dolphins sleep with one eye open?” he said, whispering between kisses. “And that a praying mantis's ear is in the centre of its chest? And that you are exactly 99.97% sexy..?”

“Oh really?" Chanyeol smiled into the kiss. "That _is_ quite sexy…”

"It is. It's very sexy.” Baekhyun helped Chanyeol out of his shirt, and then began kissing a trail down the front of his body, over his chest and stomach. The stem of the sunflower tattoo ended just above Chanyeol’s navel, and he loved watching Baekhyun follow the length of it with his lips.

Pulling down the waistband of his boxers slightly, Baekhyun paused to trace a prominent vein in Chanyeol’s abdomen with his tongue, looking up at his eyes as he did so. "Do you want me to tell you more about my day,” he asked in a low voice, “or should I put my lips to better use?” And Chanyeol always enjoyed hearing about Baekhyun’s library adventures, but he couldn't resist the second option. 

"Whatever you want, babe… I'll give it to you," Baekhyun whispered, his hot kisses on the inside of Chanyeol's thigh making him shiver. Sometimes he liked to blow raspberries in Chanyeol’s skin when he kissed him there, and they would both laugh at the sound it made. He was a sweet lover, playful and gentle and endlessly giving, and always seemed to derive much more enjoyment from Chanyeol’s pleasure than his own. But as much as Chanyeol was left feeling satisfied and worn out afterwards, he still couldn’t get to sleep. He lay in the dark for what felt like ages, staring dry-eyed at the ceiling. When it became too much, he quietly slipped out of bed. What was the point in lying there if he wasn’t going to sleep anyway? Switching a lamp on to see by, he tiptoed over to his desk, quietly sliding open the bottom drawer where he kept his notebook. He settled back into bed with it, flipping it open to a fresh new page. 

At first it had been sweet torture: lying there in the dark on those nights when he simply _couldn’t_ sleep no matter how hard he tried, listening to the sound of Baekhyun snoring softly beside him — his warm body curled up against Chanyeol's like a sleeping kitten. In his desperation to while away those lonely hours, Chanyeol had turned to drawing as a way to kill time; if he was lucky, half an hour of deep concentration would make him feel sleepy enough to eventually drift off. Now he pulled out his notebook at the first sign of sleeplessness, and had built up quite a collection of sketches as a result. They all depicted the same thing, which was Baekhyun while he was asleep, but somehow Chanyeol managed to capture something slightly different every time. Baekhyun made an ideal model when he was asleep, given that he slept like a log — passing out almost as soon as his head hit the pillow, and hardly moving again until morning. Occasionally he would make Chanyeol’s life difficult by rolling onto his stomach and burying his face in his pillow, but this was easily fixed with a sharp pinch on the bum, which would make him grumble in his sleep before rolling onto his back again. So far he had never woken up, and Chanyeol was happy to keep it that way. He didn’t think Baekhyun would be put off by his secret hobby, but it was something he wanted to keep to himself, at least for as long as he could help it.

Chanyeol frowned at the drawing, holding it up in front of his face to study it from a slight distance. He was glad Baekhyun’s eyes were closed, at least, for they would have been difficult enough to draw; how could he ever hope to capture the light in them with only a humble pencil? And then there was his mouth; how to do justice to that mouth, one that could produce the loveliest smiles when Baekhyun was awake, the sight of which stirred Chanyeol's heart like nothing else? He loved Baekhyun’s smiles most of all, but also the way his lips moved when he talked, how they reshaped themselves to form every word — this was to say nothing of his kisses. Chanyeol had spent enough time being mesmerised by that pretty mouth and its many talents, but apparently not enough to create a satisfactory likeness of it on paper; he furiously rubbed the pencil lines out, blew the eraser dust off and started again. The very first time he drew Baekhyun it had turned out surprisingly well, as though his hand was being guided by someone else, but since then he’d had varying amounts of success. So far, tonight’s effort wasn’t one of his best, but there was time yet to turn it around.

He was almost done and finally satisfied with the outcome when Baekhyun stirred, murmuring something in his sleep. His lashes fluttered, and Chanyeol held his breath for a moment until he heard a long, deep exhale. Then Baekhyun began softly snoring again, and Chanyeol smiled to himself as he went back to his drawing. When he was happy with the shading on Baekhyun’s lips, he dotted in the tiny mole above his mouth, wondering if the soft scratching sound of his pencil on the textured paper ever worked its way into Baekhyun’s dreams. Upon finishing, he scrawled 'angel in repose' beneath the sketch along with the date, then returned the diary to its hiding place and crawled back into bed. It was well past three o'clock by the time he fell asleep. 

 

 

_______________________________

 

_December 18th_

_Sometimes I wonder if my silly jokes will ever start to grate on your nerves. I hope that day never comes; your laughter is by far the best medicine._

 

_______________________________

 

 

Even if it wasn’t the finest example of artistic skill, Chanyeol's little sketchbook turned out to be a good way to monitor the progress of his insomnia. He could tell things were getting worse when he would end up sketching several nights in a row, and somehow he’d gone from waking up a couple of times a night to hardly sleeping at all. Sometimes it was only an hour or two before daybreak by the time his body finally gave in to his exhaustion. When he did sleep, there were new details popping up in his dreams; new fragments to piece together. At times he felt an oppressive heaviness, like something was pushing him down into the mattress; he felt it even on those nights when Baekhyun wasn’t sleeping on top of him. He began to dream about finding blood on his hands. It was so real he could smell the iron in it, could feel the stickiness of it between his fingers. He would look down at his hands and just see it there, dark red and coagulating, but he could not figure out how it got there.

He didn’t know how to broach the subject at home. Sometimes Baekhyun mentioned something about him looking tired when they saw each other in the morning, but usually he’d just lift a hand to Chanyeol’s face, whisper _“smile, gorgeous,”_ and give him a squeaky kiss on the cheek. He’d mostly stopped asking if Chanyeol was sleeping okay — probably because Chanyeol always insisted that he was. But he knew Baekhyun could probably see right through this from the way he looked at him afterwards: with one eyebrow raised a hair higher than the other, his lips curved downwards in a slight frown. Chanyeol often got the feeling that Baekhyun could read him just by looking at him; even so, Baekhyun never confronted him about any of these things.

 

Now it was morning again, and Chanyeol was not a morning person at the best of times, let alone at the worst of them. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept the whole night through; every day began the same way it ended, like he was stuck in some kind of Groundhog Day situation — one in which the date changed, but nothing else did. He was standing in front of the kitchen window, crusty-eyed and listless, when Baekhyun strolled in looking fresh as a daisy. He paused to give Chanyeol a kiss on the cheek and a little pat on the bum. “There’s a really sweet rainbow outside today. I just took a photo of it out on the balcony,” he said, sounding chipper as usual. He stood on his toes, reaching up to the cupboard above the stove for a mug. “You look sleepy, babe. Do you want some coffee?”

Chanyeol shook his head. “Already had some.” His body had been on autopilot since he got out of bed: _go to toilet, wash hands, go to kitchen, open fridge, get milk, spill some, wipe it up, make coffee, drink it, choke on it a little, drink some more._ His legs had walked him right into the corner of the bench top, and he knew he would have a terrible bruise there later. His hipbone still throbbed with the pain, but he was mostly too tired to worry about it.

Baekhyun sniffed the spout of the milk carton and wrinkled his nose. “Hey Sunny, have you been drinking this?”

"Yeah. Why?"

“It’s a bit whiffy… I think it’s off,” Baekhyun said. He squinted at the use-by date. “Yep, four days out of date. She’s a goner.”

"Oh. I didn’t even notice." Truthfully, Chanyeol was so out of it that Baekhyun could have thrown the carton of expired milk at his face, and he probably wouldn’t have noticed that either.

Baekhyun walked over to the sink and poured the rest of the milk down the drain. “I suppose the coffee masked the taste. Remember to check the expiry date on things before you use them, okay? You’ll make yourself sick if you’re not careful.”

"You shouldn't pour that down the drain, you know," Chanyeol said absently, watching Baekhyun rinse the carton out under the tap. “I mean, the poor fish, in the sea…”

Baekhyun turned around, shooting him a quizzical look. ”What about the poor fish in the sea..?”

Even in his nearly catatonic state, Chanyeol could feel his mouth begin to twitch at the corners. "It's just not very considerate, that’s all. Some of them might be lactose intolerant."

Baekhyun flicked him on the arse with a tea towel instead of replying, but Chanyeol got a chuckle out of him anyway, and it suddenly made him feel a lot better. Even if he wasn’t good for much else at the moment, at least he could still make Baekhyun laugh.

 

The little bit of energy Baekhyun’s laugh gave him didn’t last, though. As soon as Chanyeol dragged himself into work later that morning, he plopped down in front of his desk, burying his head in his hands; he was clearly going to have to do something sooner or later, but he'd been trying to put it off until he worked out what that was. There were too many things to consider: so many pills and therapies and natural remedies he’d been reading about during his spare moments at work, and where was he supposed to start? He would have to talk to Baekhyun first, as soon as he was ready to open up to him about it.

“So, first thing on today’s agenda: we need a short piece to go up on the website about the upcoming community arts festival. And the aquatic centre’s just put new access ramps in, so we need something on that as well.” Chaerin plonked a takeaway coffee down on the desk in front of Chanyeol, shaking him out of his stupor. "Here you go… drink up.” She gave him a pointed look. “You _really_ look like you need it, hon.”

"Yes, boss,” Chanyeol said. Though he made an honest effort not to, he sounded like a robot anyway.

"That was a bit lacking in the enthusiasm department.” Chaerin laughed softly. "Should’ve got you a double-shot. Now I’m worried you won’t make it past midday.”

“I will. I’ll be fine.” To lighten the mood a little, Chanyeol joked, "if you can't find me at any time during the day, I'm probably napping under my desk."

Chaerin humoured him with another chuckle. “Seriously though, I really think you should see someone about these sleeping problems you're having.” She looked genuinely concerned again, and as usual it only made Chanyeol feel bad. "I'm not just saying that as your manager, but as a friend. Have you tried any of the usual remedies — melatonin, valerian root..?”

"I'll get it checked out, I promise," Chanyeol said, as a way of moving along from the subject. He was fine, really; he was just a bit tired and mopey, that was all. The situation wasn't dire. He still showed up to work every day, still did his job satisfactorily — at least, he thought he did. Chaerin had never said anything to indicate otherwise.

 

By the time evening came, as expected, an enormous bruise had bloomed over his hipbone. Baekhyun touched it while they were in bed together, gently circling the edges of it with his fingers. “Yikes… what happened here?”

Chanyeol lay there with his arms folded behind his head, staring up at the ceiling. ”Oh, you know. Just banged it on the corner of the kitchen bench, like the dummy I am."

Baekhyun stroked Chanyeol’s sore hipbone some more, and then he shimmied down to kiss it better. “I’m going to call it Iris,” he said. Chanyeol didn’t know why; he was too tired to ask. Probably because the bruise was purple, he thought, or maybe because the shape of it looked vaguely like a flower. Baekhyun often drew comparisons between Chanyeol and flowers, which Chanyeol thought was sweet, if a little odd. He also had a penchant for humanising everything; he gave life to things that weren't alive, even the furniture in their apartment. Every object had its own personality, its own consciousness — to the point that when things were damaged or broken, he felt sorry for them. It felt like everything he touched became alive and real like him, but somewhere along the way Chanyeol had stopped doing that — stopped coming alive beneath Baekhyun’s hands. Baekhyun was life itself, and he slept well at night, but Chanyeol was running out of fizz and he couldn't keep up.

 

 

In spite of this, his Sundays spent in the van were a welcome respite from the daily grind, and Chanyeol found he now looked forward to them more than he ever had previously. If Baekhyun wasn’t working he would usually tag along, and it was always more fun when he was there. Most of the time they'd spend the rest of the afternoon at whatever beach they'd ended up at, mucking around in the surf for a bit, and then falling asleep on top of each other while lazily making out on the sand — which had resulted in a couple of spectacular sunburns. Chanyeol still enjoyed the days when he was alone, though, because it gave him the time and space to think.

Now it was the height of summer, and the temperature was expected to hit the mid-thirties that day. To avoid a turf war with Jongdae, Chanyeol went north, following Lawrence Hargrave Drive along the coast to do the rounds there instead, stopping past every seaside village on his way. There were people everywhere, out and about, soaking up the sunshine — sunning themselves on the Norfolk-pine-lined beach at Austinmer, and crammed around the rickety white tables outside the Scarborough Hotel. Kids waved at him from the footpath while he drove over the Sea Cliff bridge, following the winding curve of the road around the cliffs. There were people leaning over the railings of the walkway, looking out towards the eternal ocean; when he saw them, a feeling of unease sat heavy in his stomach, only subsiding once he reached the other side. He stopped off at Stanwell Park to watch the hang-gliders, and raked in quite a bit of money there, but didn’t stick around too long; it was far too hot, and the air-conditioning in the van wasn’t coping as well as he would have liked. Still, it was an undeniably glorious day: the white-hot sun hanging high above him, the sky so blue and cloudless that he felt the need to reach out and touch it. The colour made him think of Baekhyun; of sliding one hand through his soft blue hair while making love to him that morning, then trailing it down over the side of his face, slipping two fingers into his mouth. When Chanyeol closed his eyes for a moment, he could still feel Baekhyun’s lips closing around his fingers to suck them, his teeth grazing against his knuckles. 

Maybe it was because he drew so much these days that he was starting to look at things differently, but lately Chanyeol had begun to see and feel Baekhyun everywhere around him, in the sky and the sea and the mountains; it was as though he had lain down on the ground long ago, and the Earth had formed itself around his sacred body. If the blue sky was his hair, then the sunlit peak of Mount Keira was the top of his shoulder, one of the places where Chanyeol liked to kiss him the most. The crest of Bald Hill was the soft little mound of a belly that had started to form where his abs used to be, something he lamented as much as Chanyeol loved it. His smile was a bright sliver of the moon, and when he laughed it was the sound of the ocean lapping at Chanyeol’s feet. Kissing his mouth was like standing up on the cliffs and trying to breathe with a strong sea-wind blowing right in your face, vital but taxing; it took everything out of Chanyeol just as much as it made him feel more alive. The more he thought about it, the more he wondered what the world around him had looked and felt like before Baekhyun came along. What had it all meant? The life before was something he could no longer picture, even with his eyes closed.

 

He was driving through Thirroul on his way back that afternoon when his eyelids began to feel unbearably heavy; they drooped for a moment, and he opened them again to see a little girl run out on the road right in front of him. Chanyeol only managed to brake just in time, slamming his foot on the pedal with a sickening screech, the force of the sudden stop throwing him forward in his seat. He sat there, dazed, watching the girl scramble away to safety. He was close enough to see the terror in her eyes, and he had to pull over for a while because he felt sick, resting his head on the steering wheel until he was no longer so painfully aware of his heart pounding in his ears. His chest felt tight, and it was hard to breathe in all the way. The chime played over and over in the background, until it became just another noise, no longer recognisable as a tune. Eventually he realised it was still going, and he turned it off. On the plus side, now he'd been scared wide awake again.

As soon as he felt better, he planned to drive the van straight back to his parents' place to avoid any further mishaps, but first he fished his phone out from his pocket. He desperately needed to hear Baekhyun's voice, even if it was only for a couple of minutes. He was working at the bookshop that day, but there was still a chance he'd answer his phone if Chanyeol called him.

"Hey sexy,” Baekhyun purred into his ear, picking up after the second ring. "How'd you know I was bored shitless?"

Chanyeol smiled. "I didn’t,” he said quietly, “I just really wanted to hear your voice."

Baekhyun chuckled softly, the sound making Chanyeol's chest feel tight all over again, but only for a second. “Well, I’m glad you called — it's dead as. I suppose no one wants to be stuck inside a bookshop when the weather's this good. How’d you go today?"

“I’ve done pretty well, actually,” Chanyeol said, “although I’m sure it would’ve been even better if you were here with me. Anyway, I won't keep you too long. I just wanted to say I love you. I might visit my parents for a while after I drop the van off, so I’ll see you at home later."

"Okay, I love you too. Tell them I said hi."

"Will do." Chanyeol ended the call, then turned on the radio to silence his scrambled thoughts. 

 

When he arrived at his parents' place, his mother welcomed him in at the door. "Your sister was here only an hour ago,” she said, standing on her toes to give him a kiss on the cheek. He still had to bend down a bit to accommodate her — there was no doubt about it, all that height had definitely come from his father.

"Oh yeah? I'm sorry I missed her." Chanyeol looked around the house as he followed his mother to the kitchen. "Where's Dad?”

Mrs. Park laughed at the question. “Passed out on the sofa. Where else do you want him to be on a Sunday afternoon?" Then she added, "and practically every afternoon, now that he's retired.”

"Living the dream, huh,” Chanyeol said, smiling. “Good on him.”

“How was business today?" Mrs. Park herded him into the kitchen and made him sit at the table, where she set down a bowl of spicy beef soup in front of him, and then some smaller bowls of kimchi and rice. Chanyeol hadn’t stopped for lunch that day, and it wasn’t until he saw and smelled his mother’s cooking that he realised how hungry he was.

“Pretty good… it’s nice and hot out there. I went north along the coast this time, just for a change of scenery.” Chanyeol left out the part where he’d fallen asleep for a second while driving, and the little girl running out onto the road in front of him — it was probably better that his mother didn’t know about that. The thought made his stomach churn a little, momentarily dulling the edge of his appetite.

Mrs. Park frowned at him, studying his face with the eagle eyes of a mother. “Are you alright? You look a bit unwell.”

Chanyeol sighed, lifting another spoonful of soup to his mouth. “So I keep hearing,” he said. “I’ve just been a bit tired lately, that’s all; otherwise I’m okay. Nothing to worry about.”

She tutted. “Oh, that’s no good… maybe you should go see Dr. Zhang. I can make an appointment for you—”

“Mum, I’m an adult — I can make my own appointments. And I’m fine. I’m not sick, I’m just not sleeping very well at the moment.”

“Well, there’s probably a reason for that, darling.” She sat across from him at the table, still frowning, and watched him eat with her chin resting upon one hand. “I don’t think people just stop sleeping out of nowhere.”

She was right, it _hadn't_ been out of nowhere. It had been a long time in the making — probably years — starting with Chanyeol waking up once or twice in the night, and culminating in the present situation, which was him only getting a few hours before dawn if he was lucky. Thankfully, though, she didn’t press him for more information. Now she was smiling again, her eyes crinkling at the corners as she watched him eat heartily. She had made a point of teaching him to cook before he left home, and though Chanyeol considered himself more than competent in the kitchen, he knew he would never compare to her. She had always loved watching him and his sister Yoora enjoying her food. 

“Is it good?" she asked, grinning at him — she knew how bloody good it was, and Chanyeol could tell she was only fishing for a compliment. But he found it endearing, and he didn't hold back on the praise.

"Good? I think this might be the best yukgaejang you've ever made.”

She laughed at that. "A sweet-talker just like your Dad,” she said, in a playfully accusatory tone, but she clearly couldn't keep the smile off her face. She got up from her seat and walked over to the pot waiting on the burner. “I made extra so I can give you some to take home. I have some other goodies for you, too. Do you need more kimchi..?”

Chanyeol wasn’t about to refuse her. “I always need more kimchi,” he replied. “Baekhyun will be very grateful too, I’m sure; the poor guy has to put up with my cooking every day. He says hi, by the way.”

Mrs. Park nodded, but didn’t turn around. “I taught you well, though, so I’m sure he’s eating like a king. How is he, anyway?”

“Good. He’s really enjoying his new job at the library, and now he’s dropped the delivery gig completely.” Chanyeol picked at the last pieces of kimchi in the dish in front of him. “It’s great having him at home every night. Means we get to spend a bit more time together.”

“Ah, well that’s nice.” Mrs. Park began bustling around the kitchen, pulling out various containers for Chanyeol to take home with him. “He's a very nice boy, I’ve always liked him.”

Chanyeol had a hard time trying to keep the grin off his face when he heard her say this. “What are you on about? You’ve only met him twice.” He wasn't all that surprised that Baekhyun had won his mother over though, because Baekhyun won everyone over, sooner or later.

Mrs. Park turned to look at him with her brow furrowed, but then her expression turned thoughtful. “Oh, yes, I know... but it just feels like he’s always been a part of the furniture, somehow. Anyway, I'm just glad you seem to finally be happy again. I can forgive the fact that I might not get any grandchildren from you, just as long as you’re happy.”

“Come on, Mum." Chanyeol couldn’t help laughing. He knew his mother’s guilt-tripping was lighthearted, even if there was a nugget of truth in there somewhere. 

“It’s alright. Your poor sister has already accepted that she’ll have to make up for you in that department.” There it was, the melodramatic sigh he’d been expecting.

Chanyeol smiled, but it eventually began to fade. “Mum, can I ask you something?”

“Yes darling, of course you can.”

Chanyeol watched the back of her head as she continued ladling soup into a container for him. “Lately I’ve been thinking a lot,” he said quietly. “About the Accident.”

As soon as he said this, he saw his mother stiffen slightly, but she quickly composed herself. She looked up from where she now stood, in front of the bench facing the kitchen window, but did not turn her head towards him. After a long moment, she said, “what about it?”

Chanyeol was almost tempted to say “never mind” when he saw how her mood had suddenly changed, but he persisted. “I don’t know. I’ve just been having some bad dreams about it lately… or at least I _think_ that’s what they’re about. And it just made me think about how I can’t remember much from that time in my life; but at the same time, I think some things are starting to come back to me.”

Mrs. Park didn’t reply; she just kept filling containers with food. Why was she saying nothing? It infuriated him that she did that — that she withheld so easily — when only a few words might make all the difference to him.

“I just really wish I knew _why_ I can’t remember,” he said, breaking the silence when she refused to. “Sometimes it keeps me up at night, the fact that I don’t know what happened. Or if I had anything to do with it.” Was it manipulative of him to say something like that? It was true, anyway, so he figured it was okay. It wasn’t like he was lying to her. “And it just seems unfair that I can’t seem to remember much about Kris anymore, when he must have meant so much to me at the time.”

When his mother finally turned around to look at him, she was chewing her lip, almost as if she felt guilty about something. Then she sighed and said, “you had some kind of therapy done; a kind of experimental procedure that was supposed to help with the trauma. I’m not too sure of the particulars, because it was something you decided on your own. Your father and I were not privy to that decision.” She went back to filling her containers, though her movements as she did so were a little sharper now, a little less gentle. “It left you in a strange sort of fugue state for a while afterwards, and when that subsided, there was clearly some loss of memory. I’m afraid I don’t know much else about it, and if I did, I would tell you.”

Chanyeol’s brow furrowed. “Does Dad know about this too..?”

“Of course he knows. You were so muddled at the time that I think everyone knew.”

“What, and you all just collectively decided not to talk to me about it?”

Again, Mrs. Park remained silent. Chanyeol studied the back of her closely, taking in the sprinkling of grey in her hair, the slight hunch in her shoulders. Those loving, hardworking hands that had nurtured him for years, ladling soup into a container for him and his boyfriend, whom she had welcomed into her home as if he were one of her own. It almost made him feel bad for drilling her, but she clearly knew things he didn’t know, and it was unfair of her to keep those things to herself; to shoulder such a burden alone, while he had been left in the dark all this time.

“Why didn’t you tell me about this before?” he said at last. “Is this why I can’t remember..?”

She snapped a lid onto the container, then stopped what she was doing to look at him. Her voice was softer when she spoke. “Do you really remember nothing about him at all?”

“I vaguely remember when we first became friends… the basketball years. Anything beyond that is where it starts getting fuzzy,” Chanyeol said. On a few occasions, he had visited Kris’s old Facebook page and sifted through the photos there. There weren’t many photos to begin with, but there were a few old pictures of the two of them together — with their arms draped around each other’s shoulders, or wearing the uniform of their high school basketball team, or smiling with their friends at parties. That was it, really; it didn’t tell him anything about what their relationship had been like. If he was feeling particularly masochistic, he would sometimes read some of the tribute messages that friends had left on his wall after he died (there had been a flood of them), just to see if they might give any clues as to what kind of person he had been — if they would trigger anything that had been buried in his own memory. So far they hadn’t. The two of them had shared several mutual friends from school; but with the exception of Minseok, Chanyeol had stopped seeing them all at some point in time, and he couldn’t recall any particular reason for it. Perhaps they had simply drifted apart. 

Mrs. Park sighed, and looked at him with a gentle expression. “Yeollie, it’s not that I want to keep things from you. I just don’t think it’s a good thing for us to talk about. The way he died was… it wasn’t just tragic, it was awful, and I don’t think you need those images in your head. All you need to know is that you had nothing to do with it. So please, for your own sake… just stop dwelling on it and let it go.”

As usual, being told he had nothing to do with it only made Chanyeol think that he’d probably had everything to do with it. “But was I there?” he asked. “Did I _see_ it happen?”

She let out an exasperated groan. “Chanyeol, please… that’s enough.”

“What if I _need_ to remember?” Chanyeol got up from the table, standing next to her so she couldn’t avoid him. “What if I’m starting to remember on my own anyway, but it’s only in tiny bits and pieces? What if it’s driving me mad?”

“You don’t know what it was like back then,” she said in a quiet voice. “We were worried about you for a long time.”

“And you’re not worried that I have virtually no memories left of a whole chunk of my life..?”

When Mrs. Park looked at him again, her expression was one of weary resignation. “No,” she said, “and you know why? Because his death left you distraught, and damaged. There was even a time after he died when you tried to harm yourself, and you very nearly succeeded. We’re just grateful that you’re alive, Chanyeol. And if it means you have to put up with a bit of memory loss, then so be it.” Then she thrust a plastic bag full of food towards him with an uncharacteristically tight-lipped smile, one that held no joy in it, and he knew that was that — question time was over. Chanyeol took the bag from her with a sigh. He knew she hated talking about these things; sometimes he forgot that it would have been a terrible time for all of them, and not just himself. He would just have to try his luck again some other time.

At that moment, his father wandered into the kitchen, looking disheveled and a little confused after waking up from his nap. He smiled when he saw Chanyeol standing there. “Oh, you’re here… how did today go?”

Chanyeol smiled back at him, trying to look like he hadn’t just been arguing with his mother only seconds before. “It went well — very well.” He lifted up the bag of food he held in his hands. “I was just about to head off, actually. Baekhyun will be home soon, and I’m sure he’s hungry.”

Doing her own bit to keep up the charade, Mrs. Park stood on her toes to give him a smacking great kiss on the cheek. “We’ll see you next Sunday, then. And make sure you bring the containers back with you.”

 

 

* * * * *

 

 

As usual, Chanyeol drove through Port Kembla on his way home, turning onto Wentworth Street. Now the sky above him wasn’t so blue anymore, washed out by the grey smoke that poured into it from the chimneys at the Bluescope steelworks. He slowed down as he passed number 43, the abandoned shopfront that Baekhyun had been sitting in front of on the day they first met. He remembered the note he'd written to himself, hidden inside his desk at home; suddenly he reversed until he was right in front of the shop again, parking his car by the side of the road.

Walking over to the shop, he stood in front of the window and peered into it, both hands shielding his eyes to keep the glare of the sun out. All he could see was an empty room, with what looked like a reception desk at the back of it, and a long corridor to the side that went somewhere else. He moved over a little to get a better view, and saw a row of doors leading all the way down the corridor, but he couldn’t see what was inside them. Behind the desk there were a couple of holes up on the wall, where it looked like a company logo or some other fixture might have once been attached, but had since been removed. There was no indication as to what the shop — if it _had_ been a shop — was for, or what service it might have offered.

Chanyeol turned away from the window, and then he noticed something white poking out from inside the mail slot in the front door — perhaps the corner of an envelope, or something else. He looked both ways up the street, checking for people nearby; but as usual for a Sunday afternoon, the place was a ghost town. There were no signs of life at all. Even the breeze blowing in from the sea only moments before felt like it had deserted him.

He bent down and slid a finger beneath the corner of the envelope, trying to coax it out of the slot. His heart thudded in his ears, and he held his breath; for a while he didn't even realise he'd stopped swallowing, until he noticed the pool of saliva collecting inside his mouth. He quickly swallowed it. The paper tore against the sides of the slot as he attempted to wiggle it out, sounding obscenely loud in the eerie quiet of the empty street; he froze when he heard a car approaching, breathing a sigh of relief when it didn't slow down on its way past.

Returning to the envelope, he yanked it the rest of the way out until the metal flap of the mail slot swung shut, ripping it even more in the process. It was large and unmarked, covered in a fine layer of dust, and was full of what felt like several hard, rectangular objects that clattered around inside it. Chanyeol glanced around one more time before tucking the envelope beneath his arm. The mural of the girl with the secret smile followed him with her eyes as he hurried back to his car.

As soon as he was safely seated in the car, he ripped the envelope open at the top and peered inside it. It was full of cassette tapes — the plastic case of each one marked with a date, and what appeared to be a person's name.

 

* * * * *

 

That night, thoughts of the abandoned shop and the envelope full of tapes became the latest thing to keep Chanyeol awake. He’d left the envelope in the boot of his car until he worked out what to do with it. He had not yet attempted to listen to any of the tapes, even though Minty — being an old relic from the nineties — still had a working tape deck. Something about the tapes made him feel nervous; like he had removed something important, something he shouldn’t have touched. Perhaps the best thing to do would be to take them back, but he would have to worry about that later. 

He didn't know what he'd been expecting his little investigation to yield, anyway — nothing, really. It wasn’t like solving this one mystery would help him to sleep again.

His thoughts scattered when he suddenly felt a warm arm around his waist, and a pair of lips against the back of his neck. “Are you okay?” Baekhyun whispered, softly kissing a trail across his bare shoulder. “You’re very quiet tonight.”

“Yep,” Chanyeol replied, “I’m just thinking.”

Baekhyun felt around for his hand in the dark and held on to it, rubbing Chanyeol’s knuckles with the pad of his thumb. Before long, Chanyeol felt his grip loosen as he began to doze off.

“Baek,” he whispered.

It took a couple of seconds for Baekhyun to reply. “Yeah babe.”

"On that day we met in the street…” Chanyeol paused for a moment and swallowed. “What were you doing there? Were you waiting for someone?”

Baekhyun was quiet for a while, but Chanyeol knew he wasn't asleep — not yet. Eventually he said, in a sleepy voice, “I was looking for something that used to be there. But it wasn't there anymore."

"Like what..?”

Baekhyun wrapped his arm tighter around Chanyeol's waist, but didn't answer his question. "Don't worry about it, Sunny.” Chanyeol could feel the warmth of him pressed up against his back, the hot breath on his shoulder. “Let's just go to sleep.”

_Easy for you to say_ , Chanyeol thought.

As soon as he was sure Baekhyun had fallen asleep — which happened in record time, as usual — he gently removed the limp arm from around his body, and got out his notebook to draw. But that night Baekhyun seemed unusually restless, tossing around so much that eventually Chanyeol just gave up; switching the lamp back off, he flopped down next to Baekhyun in defeat and moved closer, taking his sleeping boyfriend into his arms. Now that there was nothing to take his mind off it, it was hard being all alone in his misery.

“Baby,” he said. His voice sounded not quite right, like it didn’t belong in the quiet. When it was this silent, the ringing he occasionally got in his ears was much more noticeable; sometimes he didn’t know if he couldn’t sleep because of the tinnitus, or if the tinnitus was there because he couldn’t sleep.

“Uh-huh.” Baekhyun stirred, shifting a little against him. Though it sounded like a reply, Chanyeol knew that this didn't mean he was awake. He often muttered things in his sleep, even without prompting.

Chanyeol closed his eyes, burying his face against the warm skin of Baekhyun's neck. "Help me,” he whispered.

“Mmhmm,” Baekhyun mumbled in response, and then he rolled over the other way.

 

 

_________________________________

 

_January 12th_

_I keep sweet memories of you all around me, like little talismans — tiny fragments of you littered all through my consciousness. The smell of you on the sheets; the sound of your breathing slowing down right before you fall asleep; your skin beneath my fingertips. That sweet little pouty thing you do with your lips when you want me to kiss you, but don’t want to ask for it. And your beautiful hands; hands that have loved me, held me, brought me back from the darkest place. You wouldn't believe me if I told you all the ways you’ve saved me, but it’s true._

_Sometimes when I cry at night, you roll over and hold me, almost as a reflex; even when I’m trying my hardest to be quiet. I don’t even know if you’re fully awake when you do it. On those nights when you don’t hold me, I wonder if you’re just pretending to be asleep because you’re sick of hearing me cry. You sleep so peacefully, so deeply, that I sometimes feel the need to check that you're still breathing. I’m so afraid you’re going to leave me one day that I wonder if I’m slowly pushing you away; or maybe it just feels that way, and it’s all in my head. I envy you your peace of mind. Make sure you hold on to it, as long as you possibly can. You won’t realise how precious it is until it’s gone._

_How can I know if I'll ever love you fully, completely, the way you deserve, until I am pushed to the very edge of that love? Would I die for you? I don’t know. Would I live for you? That’s even harder to answer._

_I have been at the edge before. People told me it wasn't my fault… that I had no choice. For months afterwards, that was all I heard — that it was an accident, and I ‘shouldn’t blame myself’. One thing I observed at that time was how visibly uncomfortable people got in the presence of such profound, guilt-ridden grief — so uncomfortable that they would try to stamp it out with well-meaning but hollow words of comfort whenever possible. ‘You shouldn't blame yourself' was the catchphrase of the year, repeated so often that it soon became devoid of all meaning, until eventually I began to believe the opposite. Anyway, I did have a choice: when it came down to it, it was him, or it was me. That was the bottom line — him or me. In the fraction of a second I had to decide, I chose me._

_I hope that, wherever he is now, he has forgiven me for making that choice. I don’t know if I ever will._

_On those nights when I do manage to fall asleep, I alternately dream of his feet and your hands. I never dream of faces. I can’t bring myself to look at photos, even though I know I will have to at some point, so I hardly remember his face. I don’t even remember what he looked like at the last moment I saw him, because he wasn't looking in my direction; the last clear image I have in my mind is the back of his head. I can't recall his last words to me in detail, except to say that he was completely smashed and talking shit; I was slightly less drunk, and therefore responsible for getting us both home. Then he leaned over the side of the footbridge because he felt like he was going to spew, standing up on the crossbar and sticking his head right out so that the wind wouldn't blow the vomit back in his face. He leaned over too far. I can’t bear to think about what came next. I know I have to try and remember it all, or I'll be a slave to it forever, but I need more time. Sometimes I find it hard enough just to think of his name._

_Apart from that, my clearest memory of that night is the announcer lady's robotic voice over the speaker, repeating the same thing over and over: first stop North Wollongong, then Wollongong, Coniston, Unanderra, Kembla Grange Racecourse, Dapto, change at Dapto for all stations to Kiama. These days, if I ever hear that same announcement, I have to block my ears, or turn my music up so loud that I drown it out. If I didn’t, I’d probably have a breakdown or something. It’s weird, sometimes, the things that can trigger you. I really need to let go of that one._

_Now I write all the things I love about you in this little book, because those are the things I can’t let myself forget; now that I truly know how it feels to lose someone I love, to lose myself… how it feels just to lose. When I look at you, I_ _really look_ _at you, even if it's only at the back of your head while you're lying next to me. I look long and hard. I can't miss anything, not a single thing. And then I wonder why I can never sleep._

 

_________________________________

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playlist for Chapter 5:  
> 1\. [Baywara - Gurrumul](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHZjip1SEzA)  
> 2\. [Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy) - John Lennon](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lt3IOdDE5iA)  
> 3\. [Acorns and Orioles - Guided By Voices](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pFMPMSHw60)  
> 4\. [Such Great Heights - The Postal Service](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wrsZog8qXg)  
> 5\. [Everyone Is Sleeping - Little Birdy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrrWginOQlo)


	6. Strange Phenomena

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes for this chapter:
> 
> A Sunnyboy is a kind of discontinued popsicle/ice block/whatever you wanna call it, without a stick, that used to come in a brightly-coloured, triangle-shaped carton.

 

 

_________________________________

 

_February 25th_

_You are always so upbeat, so sure of yourself. Nothing ever seems to ruffle you at all, but I still can’t help wondering about you. Sometimes I look at you and wonder about your pain, the pain you never speak of — if there even is any. I wonder if you ever have those days where existing is agony; when you lie there twisting yourself up in knots, silently screaming into your hands because it’s all you know how to do._

_I haven't slept more than a couple of hours a night in... well, I’ve lost count, but I’m guessing it's been several weeks. When I woke up this morning, for a minute or two I couldn't even tell if I was dead or alive; then I saw you sleeping beside me, looking beautiful and peaceful like you always do, and I felt like maybe it didn't matter either way._

 

_________________________________

 

 

In the end, Chanyeol caved in and went to the doctor, just as his mother told him to; but being the functioning, self-sufficient and responsible adult that he was, he made his own appointment. Dr. Zhang was reluctant to prescribe him sleeping pills — people became dependent on them far too easily, he said — but he agreed to give Chanyeol a short course of medication. The pills definitely helped, at least somewhat, even if the effects didn’t always last the whole night. Chanyeol had also been instructed to cut out caffeine, nicotine and all other stimulants, which didn't agree with him so much, but by then he was so starved of sleep that he was willing to make a few sacrifices.

When he started sleeping at least four or five hours a night, things began to look up a bit; work was a little easier to cope with, and he still had bad dreams, but they were less frequent than before. Now the main thing weighing on his mind was the envelope full of cassette tapes, which was still stashed away inside his car; there was something about those tapes, the very fact of their existence, that filled Chanyeol with a sense of foreboding, like holding the unopened results of an exam that he knew he’d absolutely bombed. Part of him wanted to know what was on them, if anything, and who they belonged to — but then a part of him also didn’t want to know, and up until now, the part that didn’t want to know was winning. 

While waiting for Baekhyun to come to bed, he picked up his neglected novel from the nightstand and made an attempt to read it, but couldn’t concentrate on any particular word or phrase. Why _would_ someone stuff an envelope full of cassette tapes into the mail slot of an empty shop? And who were all those people — those names written on each tape in black marker? He had not looked through them properly to see if there were any names he recognised, although he didn’t know why there would be. 

Baekhyun walked into the bedroom then, freshly showered and smelling of shampoo, wearing nothing but one of Chanyeol’s threadbare old t-shirts again. He was rubbing his wet hair dry with a towel, and smiled when Chanyeol whistled at him. “Oh, stop it,” he said, pretending to be coy, but Chanyeol knew he loved the attention.

"What?" Chanyeol grinned at Baekhyun over the top of his book, wiggling his eyebrows in a comical fashion. "You are looking especially fine this evening, if I may say so.”

“You may.” Baekhyun went back to the bathroom to hang up his towel, calling out, "have you taken your pills yet?”

"Yes, dad,” Chanyeol deadpanned.

When Baekhyun returned, he collapsed into bed next to Chanyeol, rolling over on his side to face him. “I think you should put that book away and go to sleep.”

Chanyeol closed the book and put it back on the nightstand; he wasn’t really in the mood for reading to begin with. “For the nominal fee of only twenty _proper_ goodnight kisses — that means open-mouthed, with tongue, no pecks — I might consider it,” he said.

Baekhyun rolled his eyes at that. “Fine,” he murmured, pulling Chanyeol towards him, “you’re on.” He gave Chanyeol twenty good, slow, passionate kisses, counting them one by one, and then an extra one for good measure. When he was done he pushed him away, gently but firmly. “Alright, there’s your twenty kisses plus one. Goodnight.”

“Okay. Nighty-night.” Chanyeol reached over to turn off the lamp beside him, his fingers hovering over the switch for a few seconds, and then he moved his hand away again. “Hey — you still awake?”

“I just spoke to you a second ago, didn’t I?” Baekhyun said, opening one eye to look at him.

He had a point, Chanyeol thought. “Do you think that maybe I could have just one more..?”

Baekhyun groaned a little at first, but he caved in, giving Chanyeol one last quick kiss on the lips. His expression when he pulled away was stern, but Chanyeol could have sworn he saw a little crack in it somewhere, the beginnings of a tiny smile. “There. Now go to sleep!”

“But I can’t,” Chanyeol whined, flopping back against the bed in defeat. “I have to wait for the sleeping pills to work.”

“You haven’t actually tried yet, have you? Honestly, Yeol… even I couldn’t fall asleep that fast.” Baekhyun laughed through his nose, and then he rolled over to face the other way. “Sweet dreams, Sunnyboy.”

 

They lay in silence for a while, and then Chanyeol moved a little closer, cuddling up to Baekhyun’s back. "Did you know they don’t make Sunnyboys anymore?” he said, pressing a soft kiss upon Baekhyun’s shoulder at the same time as one hand moved around to the front of his body, sneaking beneath the old t-shirt to caress his tummy, his thighs, whatever bare skin he could reach. “I was so bummed when I found out. The ‘Orange Explosion’ flavour was my absolute favourite.”

He heard Baekhyun let out a long sigh. “That’s it. Come here,” he growled, and then he rolled right on top of Chanyeol, kissing him full on the lips. “Clearly you’re not gonna go to bed unless I wear you out first...”

Chanyeol smiled into the kiss, which made his teeth briefly bump against Baekhyun's. “Ooh, baby… are you gonna give me an Orange Explosion?”

“I’ll give you multiple Orange Explosions if it’ll make you go to sleep quicker,” Baekhyun breathed, pinning Chanyeol down upon the bed. He paused for a moment to yank the old t-shirt up over his head, shivering a little when Chanyeol reached up to put his hands on him. His body, perhaps a little softer now, was nonetheless as beautiful as ever, and Chanyeol could still feel the muscle beneath when he ran his fingers over the tensed flesh. He raised his hips so Baekhyun could slide his boxers down, and Baekhyun made a great show of doing so — pulling them off very slowly to tease him, and laughing when he whined about it. On occasion he would pause to trail kisses down Chanyeol’s bare legs before pushing them up towards his body, pressing a soft kiss here and there on the inside of each thigh. “It’s a good thing you’re gorgeous,” he whispered, “because sometimes you drive me fucking crazy.”

Chanyeol loved making love to Baekhyun, but he loved it even more when Baekhyun made love to him — looking up to see that beautiful face hovering over him, desire gradually darkening his expression, though it never clouded the love in his eyes. Baekhyun gazed back at Chanyeol through lowered eyelashes, leaning down to nuzzle his neck and whisper about how pretty he was, before reclaiming his lips in a passionate kiss. Lost in Baekhyun’s kisses, drunk on his love, the only response Chanyeol could manage was a moan buried in the back of his throat. He linked their fingers together, guiding their joined hands over his body amid desperate pleas of “ _touch me, babe,_ ” and Baekhyun happily indulged him; his other hand remained where it was, lovingly cradling Chanyeol’s head against the bed like a precious object. Despite this gesture of tenderness, he was a little more punishing than usual — pushing Chanyeol almost to the edge many times but never quite getting him there, although the promised ‘Orange Explosion’, when it finally came, was all the more delicious for it, and left him breathless and shaking for longer than it ever had before.

Looking pleased (and a little smug) with his efforts, Baekhyun lay on top of Chanyeol afterwards, as he often did, turning his head every so often to kiss his belly. “Is that our child in there?” he joked, chuckling at the gurgling within, that strange melody of squeaky little pips and pops coming from Chanyeol’s inner workings. “Yikes… sounds like a gremlin.”

Chanyeol smiled and began gently scratching the back of Baekhyun's head with his fingers, which he knew Baekhyun loved. The sleeping tablets were starting to kick in, and he felt warm and sated and slightly foggy; it was a foreign but not unpleasant feeling, and made the world around him seem soft and unfocused, a little fuzzy around the edges. “Probably the leftover Thai I had for lunch today. I believe that's the green curry talking to you now," he said. He paused for a moment, smiling again as he listened. "And that right there was the cashew nut chicken.”

“Your guts sound possessed.” With a contented little hum, Baekhyun turned his head to face the other way. He could never stay awake for very long after making love, and now he already sounded half asleep. “I like it, though. It’s oddly soothing to listen to."

"Mmm," Chanyeol murmured in reply. He winced and said, “I feel gross… I know I should probably get up and shower, but I can’t be fucked.”

“It’s okay,” Baekhyun whispered, “we can be gross together.” He took to idly playing with one of Chanyeol’s nipples, rolling his thumb over it and squeezing it with a funny honking sound that made them both laugh, and after that he began tracing the lines of the sunflower tattoo with his fingers. Chanyeol let him do this for a while, and then he took Baekhyun’s hand and softly kissed the back of it. The air in the room felt warm and heavy, almost viscous; it was a hot night, made even hotter by their recent activities, and the veins in Baekhyun’s hand and forearm were visibly swollen from the weather. 

He let out a happy sigh, revelling in the quiet languor that had descended upon the room, and resolved to do something nice for Baekhyun that weekend — he deserved it, really, for all he had to put up with. Getting less sleep during the week meant that Chanyeol had been spending more of his weekends sleeping in an effort to make up for lost time, and Baekhyun never complained about it. He seemed to enjoy spending a full Saturday cuddled under the covers as much as anyone else, but sometimes Chanyeol could tell that he was itching to get out of the house.

"Let's go out tomorrow," he said when Baekhyun sounded on the verge of dozing off again, the scattered pieces of their conversation gradually drifting farther apart. "I think we both need to get out for once.”

Yawning, Baekhyun rolled away from Chanyeol's body and curled up on the bed beside him. “Are you sure? Saturday's your only real day of rest.”

"I don't mind. I'll be fine,” Chanyeol reassured him. He leaned forward to kiss the tip of Baekhyun’s nose. “The weather’s meant to be really good tomorrow, so why waste it? We'll have a nice day out, just you and me. What do you say?"

Baekhyun attempted to stifle another yawn with the palm of his hand, but was unsuccessful. "Okay, sounds good. What did you have in mind?"

"I'll let you choose,” Chanyeol said. “We'll go wherever you want to go."

Baekhyun was quiet for a beat, and then he said “how about Kiama?"

"Kiama..?”

"Yeah, why not? It’ll be fun. We can go look at the blowhole, get some lunch… maybe walk along the beach for a bit. When was the last time you went there?"

“Dunno.” Chanyeol shrugged. “Would've been a good while ago. Should we take the van?"

“Nah, I don’t want you to turn it into a work thing... you've got all of Sunday to do that," Baekhyun said, letting out another sleepy little sigh. "Why don't we hop on the train and make a day-trip of it? Turn it into a little adventure.”

“It’ll still be an adventure if we take the car,” Chanyeol pointed out. “We could probably drive there in half the time."

“But then we can't hold hands the whole way." Baekhyun rolled towards Chanyeol and began lazily kissing along the edge of his jaw, moving over to his chin and finally his mouth. "And I can’t whisper sexy things in your ear without making you drive off the road…”

“Alright, you win,” Chanyeol whispered, smiling against his lips. “We’ll get the train.”

 

 

The next morning they stood on the platform at Fairy Meadow, waiting for the train to arrive, and Baekhyun slipped his hand inside the back pocket of Chanyeol’s shorts while he chatted animatedly about this and that. Chanyeol didn’t quite absorb most of it, partly because he was feeling unusually anxious that day; but he always enjoyed simply listening to Baekhyun speak, regardless of what it was about. 

"The train should be here in a bit," Baekhyun said. He repeated the names of the following stations as they played over the speaker, turning them into a song; it made Chanyeol feel uneasy for some reason, like he was on the verge of remembering something — something that felt like it was important. Whatever it was, the feeling teased him for a while: it toyed with his mind, tickling the edges of his memory, but nothing surfaced. He wanted to tell Baekhyun to stop, that he was making him nervous; but he didn’t know how to phrase it without sounding like he was getting worked up about nothing. Soon he began to feel breathless, even a bit panicked. The collar of his t-shirt was strangely too tight, when it had felt completely fine before. He wedged a finger underneath to loosen it a little, but it didn’t help.

“Are you okay, Sunnyboy? You look a bit pale.” Chanyeol looked over at Baekhyun to see him frowning. As chirpy as he was, he was perceptive, too; he could always tell when Chanyeol wasn’t himself.

_But if I’m not myself,_ Chanyeol thought, _then who am I?_

“I’m fine, really,” he replied, even though he wasn’t sure that this was true. “I just feel a bit out of it today.” He'd managed to get some sleep the night before, at least, thanks to a winning cocktail of sex and temazepam. He hoped the train would come soon, before the announcement was repeated again; something about the sound of that robotic female voice made him feel so ill-at-ease, like a panic attack might be on the horizon, though he couldn’t figure out why. That forgotten memory was trying to squeeze itself out, but something was blocking it; he felt the relief flood through him when the train arrived and he could finally think about something else.

Baekhyun patted him on the bum, then gave it a reassuring little squeeze. “You'll be right. I’ll make sure you have a fun day out.” He led Chanyeol by the hand through the sliding doors of the last carriage, pulling him over to an empty three-seater. "And when you get tired, we'll go home and have a nanna-nap together. Sound good?”

"Okay," Chanyeol said, smiling at him. Despite being a few years younger, Baekhyun liked to baby him, but he didn’t mind; he thought it was sweet. He leaned over to kiss his beautiful boyfriend on the cheek, whispering _“love you, cutie"_ into his ear. 

The train ride itself would have been more pleasant if the carriage didn't have empty VB cans rattling around along the aisles and beneath the seats; it also stank of stale beer and — Chanyeol wrinkled his nose — very slightly of piss. But he had to admit it wasn't all that bad when Baekhyun held his hand the entire way, and whispered sexy things to him, just as he promised he would — things like _‘hey, pretty eyes… you have my permission to eye-bang the shit out of me for the entire duration of this train ride’_. Chanyeol could almost feel the blush creeping up his neck at some of the things Baekhyun said; he was no prude himself, but Baekhyun could be a devil when he wanted to be. There was an elderly lady sitting a few rows down who stared at them baldly — and perhaps disapprovingly — from over the top of her cat-eyed sunglasses, but he couldn't help smiling anyway. Baekhyun didn’t appear to notice that they were being observed, and if he did then he didn’t care; he embraced Chanyeol freely regardless, the two of them cuddled up against the train window, and his kisses were as tender and loving as they were unrestrained.

 

As predicted, the weather was perfect that day: sunny with a few cottony wisps of cloud, the cool breeze blowing in off the ocean offering some relief from the heat. The sea was white-capped and rough, only a few brave surfers daring to ride the waves that pounded against the shore. 

"Do you ever think about how sand is just really tiny rocks?” Baekhyun said, "because I do, and it always blows my mind a bit.” His fingers skimmed over Chanyeol’s back as they walked along the beach, eventually finding his hand and holding it tight; they swung their arms between them with each step, in a playfully exaggerated way, like a pair of childhood sweethearts. With every breath of fresh sea air and the warmth of the sun on his face, Chanyeol began to feel a bit more human again.

They sat in the park across from the beach for lunch, on one of the picnic tables beneath the shade of a cluster of Norfolk Island pines, trying to ignore the group of seagulls eyeing their chips. Chanyeol threw a single chip in the middle of the birds, watching them shriek and flap about as they fought each other savagely for it.

"Well that was a mistake," Baekhyun said flatly. "They'll never leave us alone now."

“Ah, they were never gonna leave us alone in the first place. Fucking winged rats." Chanyeol tossed another chip over, one of those dodgy green-tinged ones that no-one in their right mind would eat anyway. When he looked up again, he caught Baekhyun staring at him with a fond expression, and he smiled shyly. "What..?" 

"Nothing," Baekhyun said, shaking his head, but his smile only grew wider. He pushed his lips out in a pout, and Chanyeol got the hint, leaning over across the table to give him a salty kiss. He was about to move away when Baekhyun dragged him in by the collar for another one — sucking gently on his bottom lip and slowly licking inside his mouth, whispering _“I love you”_ into it. Only when he was satisfied did he let Chanyeol go, leaving him feeling slightly dizzy with happiness.

 

After lunch, they walked up to the end of the cliffs to have a look at the blowhole. Baekhyun seemed excited about it, but Chanyeol was only mildly enthused by the idea; he'd seen the Kiama blowhole several times before, and each time it had been the same, just a hole in a rock where huge jets of water spurted out sometimes — no big deal, really. Still, there were people everywhere; walking around the perimeter of the safety fence, taking pictures of the ocean from the top of the cliff, and posing for family photos in front of the pretty white lighthouse. Baekhyun found a spot right by the fence, leaning up against the wire cables while Chanyeol kept a safe distance behind him. He remembered reading an article in the Mercury once, about two people who had climbed over the fence for a closer look at the blowhole; a particularly violent surge had swept them both into the sea, their bodies washing up separately on neighbouring beaches a few days later. They had been foreign, from memory — tourists, probably, though he couldn't remember where they were from. Having lived near the ocean all his life, Chanyeol had been raised with a fearful respect for her mercurial temperament. He looked down at the swirling, foamy water, and nearly fell over backwards in surprise when a white plume shot up through the hole in the rock, rising high into the air, prompting a collective gasp of awe and delight from the spectators gathered around the fence.

“Woah — did you see how high it went that time? I nearly got drenched!” Baekhyun held a hand up to his eyes, shielding them from the glare of the afternoon sun. When Chanyeol opened his mouth, he could taste the briny mist falling through the air, and it felt sticky on his skin. The wind had turned wild, blowing Baekhyun’s faded blue hair all over the place. He leaned over a little further, just as another huge column of spray burst forth like champagne from a giant bottle, covering the surrounding rocks with a layer of white foam.

Suddenly feeling lightheaded and sick, Chanyeol sank down to the ground, sheltering his head with his hands. He began to feel panicked again, as he had back at the station, only now it had hit him with full force. He started breathing in gulping heaves, pulling at his hair with his fingers, pulling it so hard that his scalp began to burn. Seeing Baekhyun leaning over the railing like that reminded him of those bad dreams, and the only way to get rid of that horrible feeling was to get down — right down on his hands and knees. _This is where you can't fall_ , a voice inside his head reassured him; _nothing bad can happen here, this close to the ground._ _And if something does happen, you won't see it with your head down._ He heard someone calling his name then — probably Baekhyun — but he was hard to hear over the wind and the intermittent roaring hiss of the blowhole.

Eventually Chanyeol felt a warm hand on his back, rubbing it gently. "Sunny, are you alright?" It was Baekhyun, and he sounded worried. “Did something happen? Are you sick?”

Chanyeol couldn't bring himself to lift his head. "I'm okay now, I think," he mumbled at the ground. "I was just having a bit of trouble breathing."

"Why? What's wrong..?"

Chanyeol opened his mouth to answer, but found he didn't have one to give. The nearby shriek of a seagull made him flinch. “I think… I really need to get out of here. I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright. Maybe that would be a good idea.” Baekhyun was still rubbing his back in soothing circles. "Let’s go home, okay? You probably just need some rest.” He helped Chanyeol to his feet and began leading him away from the crowd, pulling him gently by the hand. Chanyeol noticed a few bystanders staring at them curiously as they made their way through, but he was past caring by then.

 

Baekhyun was quiet during the train trip back to Wollongong; Chanyeol wasn't in any mood to make conversation either, but they held hands the whole way again, which was a small comfort. They didn't really talk about what had happened until they were lying in bed together that night, when Baekhyun broached the subject. "I'm sorry about today,” he said, sounding genuinely remorseful, which only made Chanyeol feel worse about it. “If I knew you weren't feeling great, I never would have dragged you all the way to Kiama. I would've been perfectly happy just staying at home."

"It's okay… it wasn't your fault. It was my idea to go out in the first place,” Chanyeol replied, and then he fell silent for a moment. "I just got very anxious out of nowhere, for some reason. I guess months of being sleep-deprived will do that to you. Or maybe it's the pills I’m on… I don't really know."

"I wish you'd told me you were feeling that way.” Baekhyun picked up one of Chanyeol's hands, closing his eyes while he kissed the palm of it. “You know me… sometimes I get ideas, and then I get really excited about them, and I want other people to get excited too. And my head just runs away with me, and now here we are."

Chanyeol looked at Baekhyun for a while in silence, brushing a stray lock of blue hair away from his forehead. "I know," he whispered, “and that's one of the many things I love about you, babe. It’s not something you should be sorry for.”

Baekhyun's expression softened when he heard this, but he said nothing.

"You know, I can't watch people leaning over a balcony railing, or anything like that... I don't know why, but it freaks me the fuck out," Chanyeol said quietly. "And when I saw you doing it today, leaning right over like that, I went into meltdown mode. Because I love you, so very much, and if anything ever happened to you—” He couldn't even finish his sentence before he felt like he was about to hyperventilate again, the words catching painfully in his throat. Even thinking about it was too much.

Baekhyun pulled him in closer, gathering him up against his chest. "Shhh. It's okay," he whispered. "I won't do that ever again, I promise."

"Okay. Cuddle me for a while..?" Chanyeol wrapped his arms around Baekhyun’s body, holding him tight, and soon he felt Baekhyun doing the same. He began running his fingertips down along Chanyeol’s back, soothingly tracing patterns into his skin.

"I will. I won't let you go until you tell me to." Baekhyun pressed a soft kiss to the side of Chanyeol’s neck. He fell silent, and then he said, with a smile in his voice, "well, I'll let you go if one of us needs to have a pee, or some other form of 'life event'. Deal?"

Chanyeol laughed softly. "Deal."

Before they went to sleep, Baekhyun laid his head upon Chanyeol's chest again. "My sweet love," he said in a quiet voice, his fingers dancing along the length of Chanyeol's arm, and then he laughed a little. "There was a time when I never would've dreamed of saying stuff like that… it would've made me puke. But with you I can't help myself, because it's true. You're my sweet love — my Sunny — and I adore you." Lifting his head, he leaned forward to kiss Chanyeol softly on the lips, whispering, “I sometimes feel like ‘love’ isn’t a strong enough word anymore."

"I love you too," Chanyeol said quietly, "more than anything." He was the one to drift off first for once, to the sound of ' _I love you_ ’ whispered in his ear and his mouth and the crook of his neck, over and over again.

  

* * * * *

 

Chanyeol took the van out by himself on Sunday, since Baekhyun had a shift at the bookshop again. The weather wasn't anywhere near as good as the day before; instead it was drizzly and overcast, bordering on miserable, and he ended up throwing in the towel earlier than usual. He wasn't in the mood for it that day; he needed Baekhyun there with him to be the smiley, chatty one who reeled the crowds in. It had occurred to Chanyeol lately that Baekhyun lived up to the nickname 'Sunny' far better than he did; but he had grown to love the name (and all of Baekhyun’s different versions of it) anyway.

After dropping the van off at his parents' place, he stopped off in Wentworth Street again on his way home, parking the car outside number 43, but this time he walked over to the convenience store across the road. As usual, it was one of only a handful of shops that appeared to be open. There was an older woman with dyed magenta hair standing behind the counter; she looked up when Chanyeol walked in, the sound of the motion-activated doorbell chime signalling his arrival. 

The wrinkles on the woman's face rearranged themselves as she smiled at him. “Good afternoon,” she said.

“Hello there.” Chanyeol wanted to look like he was there for a reason, so he bought cigarettes for himself and a Twix for Baekhyun, which was his favourite chocolate bar. He was itching for a smoke, even though he was supposed to be giving up in aid of sleeping properly. "Been busy today?" he asked, in an attempt to start a polite conversation. Making small talk wasn't one of his strengths, but he'd gotten better at it since he started working in the van, mainly out of necessity.

"Not really. Always dead 'round here on a Sunday." The woman accepted Chanyeol’s money, pushing his change across the counter. She had long acrylic fingernails, painted bright pink, that tapped loudly on the keys of the register. It was so quiet out in the street that Chanyeol wondered how many other people she'd seen that day, if any.

"Never changes much around here, does it?” he said. "I see that shop across the road's still closed. How long has it been?”

"Oh, yeah. That one’s been empty for several months, I think. Maybe even longer. They seem to be having some issues finding someone new to lease it to.” She turned her head to look at number 43 through the window. “It was some kind of clinic before, actually, if I recall correctly… not a shop, as such. Not too sure what they did there."

Chanyeol frowned. "By clinic you mean like a medical centre..?”

The woman shook her head. "Nah, the medical centre's up the road, next to the bank. This one was something else — one of those wanky new-age 'experimental therapy' kind of places, I think, from the looks of it. Never went in there myself, so I couldn't really tell you, but then they shut down. Apparently they landed themselves in a bit of trouble.”

Chanyeol’s ears pricked up when he heard this. “I see. Do you remember what it was called, by any chance?”

The woman looked thoughtful for a moment. “Oh, it had a weird name that sounded made-up... 'Lacuna' or 'Lanuca' or something like that.” She waved her pink-taloned hand around like it was all the same. “It was something beginning with an L, anyway.”

Chanyeol nodded, feigning only a passing interest in the topic. "Right. Well, I'd better get going,” he said. “Thanks a lot. Have a good day."

"You too, darl.” The woman glanced at the pack of Winnie Blues as Chanyeol shoved it into his pocket. "I'd tell you to give that up, but I’m a chainsmoker myself.” She grinned crookedly at him, shrugging in an apologetic kind of way. 

“It's a work in progress," Chanyeol said, shooting her one last smile from the door. "See you later."

 

He walked across the empty street to his car, but instead of driving off right away, he went to fetch the envelope full of cassette tapes from the boot and tossed it into the passenger seat beside him. He took out the first tape his fingers landed on and looked at it, turning it around in his hands. _‘Crystal Waters’_ was written on the small white label, which was not a name he recognised — it almost didn’t sound like a real name at all. He wondered if it was an alias of some kind. The date marked beneath the name was _20.5.16_. He pushed the cassette into the slot of the tape deck and pressed the play button, hearing nothing but staticky silence for a while. He was about to give up when he heard disjointed snippets of what sounded like a woman’s voice, but the audio quality was very poor and she sounded muffled. He could not make out a bar of what she was saying, save for one sentence that sounded a lot like, _‘and then he hit me’_. Then there was a terrible squeaking sound that made him jump and the audio stopped suddenly, the broken tape jamming around the spools. Chanyeol swore under his breath as he ejected the cassette, hauling out reams of shiny brown ribbon, and chucked it back into the envelope with the rest of them. 

He remained where he was for a bit longer and smoked his first cigarette in a good while, savouring it to the very last drag; when he was finished, he stubbed it out in the ashtray and made a call to his tattoo artist, another old friend from high school. “Hey Amber,” he said when she answered, “you reckon you can fit me in after work sometime this week? I've got something small in mind.”

 

* * * * * 

 

“Lacuna, lacuna, lacuna,” Chanyeol muttered absently to himself, opening Google and typing the word into the search bar. He scrolled through the results: all that came up at first were pages of definitions for the word itself, ‘an unfilled space or a gap’, ‘a missing portion in a book or manuscript’, blah blah blah. He skimmed over each result, and then he clicked back to the previous page, and then the one before that. 

He rubbed his forehead for a moment, and then tried typing in 'Lakuna' instead. A few new things came up this time: an electronic music group, and a tropical spa retreat somewhere up in the far north. He added the Wentworth Street address to his search, and something else surfaced — a result that read ‘Lakuna: specialists in mental hygiene.’ Holding his breath, Chanyeol clicked on the link, but it led him nowhere. The website appeared to have been taken down.

"Fuckity fuck." He let out a long, heavy sigh, tapping his blunt fingernails against the surface of his desk. Well, that was the end of that, apparently. Then he heard the unmistakable sound of high heels clicking on the laminate floor, getting closer, and he quickly minimised the window.

"Hey," Chaerin said, her face popping up over the top of Chanyeol's monitor. "How are you going with that piece on the artwork installation project for Crown Street mall?"

"Oh, you know. It's... going, sort of,” Chanyeol said, with a nervous little laugh.

Chaerin raised an eyebrow at him, but didn't comment further. "Alright," she said as she walked away, "just make sure you shoot it through to me by COB today.”

"Aye aye, captain," Chanyeol called out after her. As soon as Chaerin was gone, he scrolled through a few more results, which he bookmarked to read later. Sighing, he closed the browser window and went back to work.

 

At lunchtime he went to see Minseok at the bike shop, who was sitting in his office when Chanyeol showed up, a pile of forms spread out on the desk in front of him. “Hey," he said, looking at Chanyeol with raised eyebrows. "What's up? If you've come to have lunch together, you're a bit late, I'm afraid." He nodded towards the empty Tupperware container on one side of his desk. “I’ve already inhaled mine, I was that fucking hungry.”

"It's alright mate, I'm not here for lunch." Chanyeol closed the office door and stood in front of Minseok's desk, pausing to wet his dry lips before speaking again. "I know you don’t like talking about what happened to Kris, but I really need you to tell me something. And please tell me the truth," he said quietly, and then he drew a deep breath. "When he died… was it because he fell from somewhere?”

Minseok blinked up at Chanyeol, clearly caught off guard by the question. "Why are you asking me this?” he said, frowning.

Chanyeol sighed and parked his bum on the edge of Minseok's desk. "I went to Kiama with Baekhyun on Saturday, and we went to see the blowhole," he said. "While we were there, he was leaning over the safety fence, like right over it, and I completely freaked out — like the sight of him doing that actually triggered an anxiety attack. And sometimes I have this recurring dream, where I'm watching someone leaning too far over a balcony or a bridge or something, and then I see them start to go right over, and I just go crazy. There was a time when I used to wake up crying… just sobbing, like the world was ending. So I'm wondering if it's some kind of flashback situation I'm dealing with, instead of just a harmless recurring nightmare."

Minseok opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. 

"Please, Minseok," Chanyeol whispered, "I need to know. Mum and Dad already won’t talk to me about it. You can't all leave me completely in the dark forever… it’s not fair on me.”

Eventually Minseok sighed and threw both his hands up in a gesture of defeat. "Okay, fine. If you absolutely must know, then yes — he did fall."

Chanyeol leaned in closer, his heart beginning to pound inside his chest. "And he definitely fell by accident? I had nothing to do with it..?"

Minseok glanced through the glass windows of his office, apparently checking that the showroom was empty, and then he lowered his voice. “Look, I wasn't there when it happened… but I'm not gonna lie to you — _you_ were,” he said. “It was really late, and the two of you were alone, up on the footbridge at the train station. You know, those ones that run above the tracks.” He rubbed his forehead, as though doing so would aid his memory. “Anyway, the security footage clearly showed him falling — even back then, there were cameras all over the place. He was blind drunk, he leaned too far over the railing, and he fell. That was that. The fall killed him."

Chanyeol didn't reply for a moment; he was too preoccupied with trying to remember which train stations in the area had footbridges. Fairy Meadow and North Wollongong definitely did… so did Thirroul, from memory. "Do you know which station it was?”

Minseok sounded exasperated now. "It was Fairy Meadow, as far as I recall," he said wearily. "I really don't want to talk about it anymore, Yeol. I know what happened really fucked you up at the time, and I get that… but he was my friend too." He sighed and his expression softened, the furrows in his brow smoothing out as he studied Chanyeol's face. "It's not that I want to keep this stuff from you, but you were seriously screwed up for a while afterwards, because you saw the whole thing happen. Obviously you’ve repressed those memories for a reason, and I don't think me reminding you about it is gonna do you any good. In fact, your Mum, lovely as she is, would probably gut me if she knew I’ve been talking to you about it. Anyway, like I said, I wasn't there at the time. I've just told you everything I know."

Chanyeol shook his head. “It’s fine... that's really all I came to find out," he said quietly. "Thanks, man." He gave Minseok a brief but affectionate pat on the shoulder and turned towards the door.

"Hey," Minseok called out after him. “Are you gonna be okay..?” 

Chanyeol turned to look at him from the doorway. "I will be. Tell Sehun I said hi." He offered Minseok a faint smile, and then closed the office door behind him.

 

* * * * *

 

Chanyeol got home late that night after his appointment with Amber, with the stinging heat of a fresh tattoo— a welcome distraction from the maelstrom inside his head. 

"Where've you been?" Baekhyun looked up from where he stood in the kitchen, stir-frying a pan full of vegetables and soba noodles. His culinary skills had improved somewhat since they'd started living together, and Chanyeol quite enjoyed his cooking now.

"I just got caught up with something." Chanyeol walked over to give Baekhyun a kiss on the cheek, and then a softer one against his temple. "How was work?”

"Good. No turds in the returns chute today, although there was a very well-thumbed copy of 'The Beginners Guide to BDSM' in there,” Baekhyun said. “Which I may or may not have had a quick flick through before shelving it."

Chanyeol laughed as he loosened his tie. “Nice. Anything you wanna try out later tonight..?”

“Nah,” Baekhyun said, scrunching up his face. "Different strokes and all that, but I prefer sex to be mostly pain and humiliation free.”

"I know, I know.” Chanyeol leaned into the back of him while he stood there cooking, breathing in his scent. He kissed Baekhyun once more, very softly on the back of his neck. “I was only teasing, babe. Our sex is perfect as it is.”

Baekhyun was in a quiet mood when they sat down to eat, not making much in the way of conversation. He got like that sometimes, so Chanyeol wasn't too worried about it; he had enough on his own mind, anyway.

“Nuh-uh," he said, when Baekhyun stood up to collect the dirty dishes from the table. "You cooked — I'll wash up." He gave Baekhyun a kiss and said, “go to the bedroom and wait for me. I've got a little surprise for you.”

"Oh." Baekhyun looked at him curiously, but he nodded in silence and did as he was told. When Chanyeol joined him a little later, he was sitting up in bed, reading _The Beach_ and wearing only his underwear.

Chanyeol walked over to stand next to the bed. “You wanna take off my pants?” 

He said it so matter-of-factly that it made Baekhyun laugh. “What kind of question is that?” he asked, jokingly rolling his eyes. “You know the answer's always yes." 

Chanyeol watched with his tongue caught between his teeth while Baekhyun fiddled with the fly on his work trousers. With his fingers hooked beneath the waistband, he began to slowly pull them down, freezing for a moment when he saw the bandage positioned low on Chanyeol's abdomen, just above his groin. “What’s this?” He looked up at Chanyeol with concern in his eyes. “Did you walk into the kitchen bench again..?”

"Nope. It’s something a bit more fun than that.” Chanyeol bit down on his bottom lip to keep from smiling too much, and gently peeled the dressing away from his skin. “Ta-dah. What do you think?”

One of Baekhyun’s hands flew up to his mouth. "Is that..?"

Chanyeol nodded. “I got a tiny Sunnyboy tattooed on me. ‘Orange Explosion’ flavour.” He couldn't keep himself from smiling any longer. “Do you like it..?”

“I _love_ it." Baekhyun leaned in to get a closer look at the tattoo, grinning as he did so. “I can’t think of a tattoo that’s more ‘you’ than this. Apart from getting the word ‘Gaytime’ tattooed on your arse, perhaps.”

Chanyeol laughed at that. “That’ll be my next one,” he said. “Anyway, getting tattooed there hurt like a bitch, but it was worth it to see the look on your face.” He covered the tattoo up again, still smiling to himself. “I can’t let anything rub against that area until it heals, though, so we’ll have to be a bit careful. You know, during sexytime and all that.”

“Hmm. I think we can work around it.” Baekhyun grabbed both of Chanyeol’s hands, pulling him down onto the bed. He settled behind Chanyeol with one arm around his waist, kissing the nape of his neck, and then began kissing down along his back. “We can always spoon; you know I love spooning you,” he whispered. “Though perhaps not as much as I love forking you…”

"Alright, that's enough.” Chanyeol turned his head back a little so Baekhyun could kiss his mouth instead, whispering “less talking, more forking."

 

 

When they both turned in later that night, Chanyeol didn’t take his pills; instead he took out his sketchbook to doodle for a while as Baekhyun slept, waiting to be sure that he was properly asleep. Eventually he shoved the sketchbook beneath the mattress on his side of the bed and moved to get up, but he had barely put one foot on the floor when Baekhyun stirred, sighing and rolling over onto his stomach. Chanyeol stilled, listening for further movement. What would he say if Baekhyun saw him leaving the room and asked where he was going? _‘Just going to take my pills,’_ maybe. _‘Just going to the toilet… got the runs, gonna be in there a while’_ was another option. But Baekhyun only carried on with his gentle snoring; then he mumbled something that sounded a lot like 'sausage' while Chanyeol was getting dressed, and Chanyeol had to cover his mouth to hold in his laughter.

"Wants sausage even in his sleep," he murmured to himself, smiling as he grabbed his keys from the kitchen bench. He gently shut the front door behind him and hurried downstairs, running out in the street to get to his car.

When he pulled up across the road from Fairy Meadow station, it was right on midnight. The station was practically deserted, with a lone traveller seated on a blue bench down the far end of one of the platforms. According to the timetable displayed on the screens, the next train wouldn't arrive for 28 minutes. Chanyeol walked along the footbridge, scanning the iron railings. He couldn't remember if this was the same bridge from his dreams, necessarily, but Minseok had said that this was where it happened. Had Kris fallen onto one of the platforms below, or right onto the tracks? Being at the station hadn't jogged Chanyeol's memory when he was there over the weekend, and it didn't jog his memory now; he paced restlessly back and forth several times, and then he sat down at the top of the stairs leading down into the street, burying his head in his hands. He wondered if Baekhyun was waking up right now to find him missing, wondering where the hell he’d gone. Chanyeol hadn't really thought about what he might say if such a thing eventuated. He’d just taken it for granted that Baekhyun wouldn't wake up, given that he always slept so deeply.

 

But when he arrived home again — feeling no less unsettled, and possibly with even more questions than before — he found that Baekhyun was still fast asleep, with both arms wrapped around his pillow. After swallowing his pills, Chanyeol undressed and sat down beside him on the edge of the bed. He reached over to stroke Baekhyun's hair, moving it away from his face and gently tucking a few strands behind his ear.

Baekhyun let out a deep exhale and released the pillow from his hold, rolling over onto his back. "Mmm," he mumbled, “where were you before..?"

Chanyeol swallowed thickly. He could feel his heart beginning to pound. “I just went for a quick walk," he said, moving his hand away from Baekhyun’s hair. “To help me sleep.”

Baekhyun yawned in place of a response. He rolled over again, hugging Chanyeol instead of the pillow, pulling him down flat onto the bed. "Mmkay," he murmured, his voice slurred with sleepiness. His embrace was tight around Chanyeol's body, and it did not loosen even as he drifted back to sleep.

Chanyeol lay there for a while, wide-eyed and restless, hardly daring to breathe. He felt Baekhyun nosing against his chest, like a blind puppy looking for a teat; he made a few whimpering noises, and then he was quiet and still. Soon he began snoring again, and Chanyeol's hand began to wander over the edge of the bed; it slipped between the mattress and the wooden frame, delving further and further, until he felt one corner of his sketchbook with the very tips of his fingers. He moved his hand away, and eventually he began to nod off, imagining that he could feel that sharp little corner poking into his back through the mattress. Just knowing it was there made him feel strangely relieved, at least enough to finally fall asleep.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playlist for Chapter 6:
> 
> 1\. [Strange Phenomena - Kate Bush](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZxJwQ_ITpE)  
> 2\. [Can’t Explain - Alexandros](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1AMIcfm63E)  
> 3\. [Close To You - Little Birdy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aozb1lmI6cM)  
> 4\. [Slipping Away - Max Merritt and The Meteors](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qOtq-KTpGA)  
> 5\. [Part Of It - Relient K](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwNsrpgf7Ro)


	7. What Goes Around

 

______________________________

 

_July 16_ _ th _

 

_Things I love: when you lie there with your arms around me, listening to my heart_

_Things I love: kissing you while it's raining outside, when you whisper 'I love you' into my hair, my mouth and the side of my neck_

_Things I love: when you look me in the eye and tell me you want me_

_Things I love: the sound of your voice when you're turned on_

_Things I love: your breath on my lips, your hands in my hair. Your hands everywhere_

 

_Things I adore: you, always you. Only you._

 

______________________________

 

 

 

Chanyeol was sitting with Sehun and Minseok in the latter’s office on a Friday afternoon, the three of them eating a late lunch together, when he said, “you know, I’ve been wondering something… what were Kris and I like as a couple?”

Minseok looked up from his food upon hearing this, and glanced over at Sehun with raised eyebrows. “Huh… now there's a cracker of a question.”

“Well, don't look at me,” Sehun said, “I didn’t even know the guy... he was your friend.”

“I’m not trying to get any more details of his death out of you, I promise,” Chanyeol said. “I’m just curious about what we were like when we were together, that’s all.”

“Right. Well… you were quite sweet, I thought.” Minseok leaned back against his chair, looking thoughtful for a moment. “You always got along really well. You were both complete goofs, with the same warped sense of humour. He took good care of you, you took good care of him... I don't know what else to say, really. You were best mates. You loved each other very much."

"Okay. That’s… interesting,” Chanyeol said, nodding slowly.

Minseok frowned at him. “Fucking hell. You really _don’t_ remember him, do you?” The look he gave Chanyeol when he said this was clearly one of pity, and Chanyeol hated it.

“There are still a few bits and pieces, here and there, but they don't make a full story,” he said, trying not to sound too defensive. “They don't really make _any_ story."

Minseok fell into a thoughtful silence again, his lunch sitting forgotten on his desk in front of him. "If I may be allowed one observation… and I could be crossing a line when I say this, but I want to be honest with you.” He paused, as though trying to find the best way to word his response. When he spoke his voice was quiet, almost tentative. “It’s just that I never really got the same vibe with you and Kris that I get with you and Baekhyun," he said at last. "I mean, yeah, you obviously loved each other a lot. But to me it sometimes felt more like you were just really close friends; whereas I look at you and Baekhyun, and I dunno... I never say stuff like this without feeling like a dickhead, but you two make sense together. It’s almost like you were made for each other, even.” He finished his sentence with a grimace. "And now that I've said that, I'll have to go and wash my mouth out with soap. Or vodka.”

Chanyeol had to laugh — both at what Minseok had said, and at the look of eye-rolling disdain Sehun was now giving the two of them. "We _are_ cute though, aren't we?”

"How are things going with you and Baekhyun, anyway?" Sehun asked casually, shovelling some more fried rice into his mouth.

Chanyeol shrugged. “Yeah, good, I guess."

"You ‘guess’..?”

“Lately I've been wondering if there's a little more to him than I thought… I dunno, it’s just a feeling I get sometimes.” When Chanyeol’s friends gave him a look that clearly meant they expected him to elaborate, he sighed and said, “he knows pretty much all there is to know about me, but he doesn't open up about himself a lot. He's very affectionate, and tells me he loves me all the time, but he's not so verbal with his deeper feelings... and whenever he gets emotional for any reason, he gets all shy and just bottles it up. Sometimes it’s cute, but it can also be frustrating."

Sehun picked up another forkful of fried rice and fed it to Minseok, smiling at the way he cutely opened his mouth to accept it. "Well, that's alright; it's still early days, you know. You guys have plenty of time to work through stuff like that.”

“You're definitely a heart-on-your-sleeve kind of guy, Yeol,” Minseok added, "but not everyone is like that. For some of us, it's a lot harder to open up. It takes time, and trust, and effective communication.”

"Minseok would know," Sehun said flatly. "His feelings are all locked up in a vault — a vault buried at the bottom of the ocean. Took me years to find that shit and crack it open.”

Chanyeol laughed softly, and began to pick at his pasta again with diminished interest. "I suppose," he said quietly. He thought he saw a tiny flicker of a look exchanged between Sehun and Minseok, but neither of them said anything more. He knew that Baekhyun loved him, that was undeniable; but there was also a whole lot else that he didn't know. He wondered if this was the reason he'd been distancing himself a bit lately, though there was also the fact that he’d been spending much of his free time trying to find any information he could about Lakuna — what it was, who ran it, what they did there. If Baekhyun had noticed him being distant, then he hadn’t mentioned anything about it; but Chanyeol knew how observant he could be. He was sure to have picked up on something.

 

When he got home from work that night, he made the most of whatever time he could get alone, continuing his search for new information while Baekhyun did his nightly workout in the other room. There wasn't much to be found; only different rewordings of the same damning news article, which he’d already read several times. Chanyeol clicked on the link and skimmed through the article one more time:

  _A Wollongong clinic is facing closure by the Department of Health after several of its clients were left permanently brain damaged, a result of a botched procedure that purportedly erases memories._

_Lakuna, which calls itself a clinic ‘specialising in mental hygiene’, allegedly employs the procedure to help clients erase traumatic or unwanted memories. This is achieved by targeting the emotional core of a specific memory while the client is asleep, leading to its eventual degradation. The clinic charges a hefty fee for this service, depending on the detail and timespan of the memories in question. The procedure is intended to cause a very small amount of damage to brain cells, which Lakuna specialist and co-founder Junmyeon Kim has maintained is ‘comparable to a weekend of heavy drinking, which many people already partake in regularly.’ The risk is outlined to prospective clients in the paperwork that they are required to read and sign before their procedure._

_It has proven difficult to contact former clients for comment regarding the procedure’s effectiveness in other cases, as the process has been designed to allow no recollection of it happening after completion._

“What the fuck,” Chanyeol muttered under his breath. It didn’t matter how many times he’d read it, his brain still struggled to process the information contained in that article. How could such a thing be possible — a person having part of their memory voluntarily erased? Was there any way to ever feel normal again, now that he was plagued by this information — the knowledge of this dreamlike, seemingly implausible procedure. Was it possible that he’d perhaps had his own memory erased? If so, how could he ever hope to find out?

Every so often, the quiet grunts of effort from Baekhyun doing sit-ups in the spare bedroom would suddenly cease, and Chanyeol would feel a strange prickling under his skin. He closed the browser window when he heard movement from the other room, and Baekhyun came up behind him a moment later, leaning over the back of the sofa to kiss the side of his neck. He smelled sweaty from his workout, but Chanyeol didn’t mind this; if anything, it turned him on a little. 

“I'm just gonna hop in the shower,” Baekhyun said, kissing his ear. “Care to join me?"

“Nah, I’m alright. I’ve already showered, anyway.” Chanyeol picked up one of Baekhyun's hands from around his neck and kissed it. "I've still got some more work to do that’s due on Monday, and I want to finish it now so I can have the weekend free.”

"Aren't you tired?" Baekhyun made a little clucking sound of disapproval in his ear. "Remember what Dr. Zhang told you about healthy sleeping habits..?”

Chanyeol turned his head to face Baekhyun and pulled his head downwards, kissing him softly on the lips. "You go," he whispered. "I'll catch you in bed later."  He could sense Baekhyun's disappointment in the way his shoulders dropped a little, but he simply shrugged and began to move away. 

Chanyeol grabbed him by the wrist, pulling him back before he could get very far. "Wait. Come over here for a second.” He waited for Baekhyun to stand in front of him, and them pulled him onto his lap and kissed him one more time, both hands gently massaging his waist. "Do you mind not being incredibly, frustratingly beautiful for just one minute, so that the rest of us can live in peace?”

Baekhyun laughed. "Oh, shut your face.” He gave Chanyeol a playful shove, but allowed him one more kiss before being sent away with a friendly slap on the bum. He definitely looked a bit happier when he walked off the second time, and it made Chanyeol smile to himself. As soon as he heard the shower being turned on, he went back to poring through whatever he could find about Lakuna, but there was nothing he could see that he hadn't already read before. 

 

Eventually he must have fallen asleep; he woke up the next morning with his feet up on the coffee table, the laptop having slid off his lap and onto the sofa beside him during the night. He licked his dry lips and rubbed his eyes, then looked around for his phone, which he found wedged in the gap between the cushions. He saw that the time was 8.25 in the morning and groaned.

Baekhyun emerged from the bedroom a little later, dressed in tight black jeans and a matching t-shirt. "You didn’t come to bed at all last night,” he said when he saw Chanyeol sitting there, and stood before him with both hands on his hips, looking a little put out. “What were you doing, anyway..?”

“I was just working on some stuff. Once I'm on a roll, I don't really like to stop until I’m finished,” Chanyeol said, trying to sound apologetic. He occasionally brought work home with him to finish over the weekend, so he didn’t think this excuse would sound out of place. If it did, then Baekhyun didn’t quiz him about it. He just pouted a bit in that slightly sulky way he sometimes did when he was upset, and walked over to the kitchen.

“You want some coffee?” he called out a moment later, and Chanyeol knew then that he was (mostly) forgiven.

“Yes please,” Chanyeol said. Baekhyun brought him a cup of coffee in a Smurf mug, and they went out on the balcony together, sitting down on the two folding chairs facing the street. It was quiet, with only the odd car passing through every couple of minutes, and the sound of Baekhyun blowing on his coffee, followed by the cute slurping sounds he made as he sipped it. Magpies warbled to each other in the tall gum tree across the road.

“This is nice," Baekhyun said with a happy little hum, leaning back against his chair. "We haven’t done enough of this, lately... spending time together in the mornings. In fact, I feel like I’ve been seeing a lot less of you.”

“I’ve just been extra busy with work, that’s all. It’ll calm down again soon." Chanyeol leaned over to put a hand on Baekhyun's thigh, rubbing it gently. “We can spend time together today, though, right?” he said hopefully.

“Well, we _could_ do that," Baekhyun said, "except for the fact that I’m in the bookshop all day. I'm filling in for someone, remember?"

“Oh, right. I forgot about that." Chanyeol sighed. "Saturdays are the only day we really get to spend together, too.”

Baekhyun turned to look at him with a little smile, and then he got up from his chair and leaned over to kiss him. “It’s okay,” he whispered, “I won’t be working tomorrow this time, so I can come and join you in the van. It’ll be fun.”

“Alright… that does make me feel better, then. You’re looking very handsome today, by the way.” Chanyeol smiled against Baekhyun’s lips. He pulled away for a moment to press his face into Baekhyun's neck, breathing him in. "You smell great, too."

“Thanks." Baekhyun chuckled softly. "I’d like to say the same about you, but you look like you just rolled out of bed. Or off the sofa, in this case.”

Chanyeol pretended to look hurt, although he wasn't really. "I thought you liked the way I look in the morning..."

“I do,” Baekhyun said, kissing him again. "I like the way you look all the time. I’m just shit-stirring you, as per.”

"Are you going?" Chanyeol grabbed on to Baekhyun’s hand, holding on to him for a moment. He pushed his lips out for another kiss. 

Baekhyun smiled and granted it willingly. "Yeah, unfortunately. What are you planning to do today?”

Chanyeol shrugged. “Dunno. Might just lie around here pining for you until you come home.”

“Well, I’ll be home soon enough to reward you for all your pining,” Baekhyun said with a wink, “but I’m opening up the shop today, so I'd better be off." He gave Chanyeol one last kiss, long and slow and soft, and then he hurried back inside, swiping his keys and backpack from the bench on his way past the kitchen. "See you later,” he called out; he blew Chanyeol a kiss and waved at him from the front door, then shut it behind him. Chanyeol jumped a little when he heard the door get flung open again a second later, and Baekhyun poked his head through to call out "do you mind stripping the bed and washing the linen today? The weather’s gonna be nice and hot, you can hang it all up outside. Love you, Sunnyboy.” He aimed a few more long-distance kisses at Chanyeol, and then he was gone again.

 

Chanyeol sighed and headed over to the bedroom, where he pulled the sheets off the bed and dumped them in the washing basket, ready to take down to the communal laundry. Then a sudden thought niggled at him — the tapes he’d found at the abandoned clinic, which were still hidden inside his car. He still had the rest of them to listen to. Thinking about it gave him that uneasy feeling in his stomach again, but it was just like a bandaid, he reminded himself; he just had to rip it off and be done with it, and then it would be one more thing off his mind.

After he was done with the day’s housework — remaking the bed, cooking all their lunches for the week ahead, cleaning the bathroom and kitchen — he went down to his car to listen to the rest of the tapes. The first one he picked up was marked with the name ‘Lu Han’, which he pushed into the slot and pressed play, landing in the middle of what sounded like a recorded conversation between two strangers. He rewound the tape to the beginning and pressed play again. 

There was a long pause before anyone spoke. _“My name is Lu Han, and I'm 27 years old,”_ said a young man’s voice. _“I’m here because I would like to erase my relationship with my former boyfriend, Zitao Huang.”_

Then another voice spoke: also male, gentle, older than the first speaker. _“If you could, please provide a brief history of your relationship with Zitao, and why it is that you wish to erase him from your memory. We'll get to targeting specific memories later.”_

_“Zitao and I met at a party through mutual friends, and we hit it off right away,”_ the young man named Lu Han said. _“For the first year, everything was great; but then it began to go downhill very fast. Suddenly he was distant. He didn’t want to touch me anymore; he was home late all the time… he would snap at me for no real reason at all. I began to suspect he was cheating on me when an acquaintance mentioned seeing him out one night, after Zitao had told me he would be working late that same evening. Finally, after nearly two years together, he left me for his supervisor at work. I've spent the last six months going from one rebound to the other, in the vain hope of making him jealous enough to maybe want me back — or at the very least, to find someone nice so that I might be able to move on — but so far I’ve had no luck. All I want to do is wipe the slate clean. I want to get on with my life, but I can’t. The memory of what he did to me — of how he betrayed me — keeps holding me back.”_

Chanyeol listened to the rest of the recorded conversation, ejecting the tape when it was finished and immediately slotting in the next one. He listened to them all, one by one; each person’s story was different, but heartrending in its own way. There was a woman who also wanted to erase memories of her unfaithful lover, much like Lu Han had. Another woman, a mother, wished to be rid of the hurt caused to her by her drug-addicted wayward son, whom she hadn’t seen in years. He heard one depressing story after another — former lovers who had fallen apart; a dear friend lost to suicide; a beloved pet dog that had been purposely run over by a vicious neighbour. There were stories of abuse and neglect, of broken trust, of absence, of profound loss. By the time he'd listened to them all, Chanyeol had dissolved into tears; he hunched over against the steering wheel and wept. It was too much — his mind was reeling, and apart from the combined sorrow of all these people, these strangers, he felt confused and devastated, and even slightly sick. It was, he realised, much the same feeling he got after waking up from one of his nightmares. 

 

When he got back to the apartment, he flopped down on the sofa, too physically and emotionally exhausted to do much else, and mucked around on his laptop for a while. At some point he dozed off again, later waking up to a soft kiss upon his forehead. As his eyelids fluttered open, the first thing he saw was Baekhyun's beautiful smiling face, hovering upside-down above him.

"Hi, Sunny.” He chuckled softly. "You fell asleep on the couch again, babe. Are you okay?”

Chanyeol blinked up at him for a moment, and then he finally sat upright, rubbing his eyes. "Yeah… I was just a bit tired, that’s all. How was work?"

"Good. Uneventful." Baekhyun walked off to dump his keys and bag on the table, and then he disappeared down the hallway. As soon as Chanyeol heard the sound of the bathroom door closing, he pulled the lid of his laptop shut and went to put it away. 

“I’ve got something to show you,” Baekhyun said in a singsong voice when he came back into the room. “A surprise!” He stood in front of Chanyeol, wearing a silly grin on his face, and lifted his shirt up. There on the lower part of his ribcage, right before it smoothed out into his waist, was a small white bandage. “What do you think it is, huh?”

Chanyeol stared at the bandage with raised eyebrows. “You didn’t..!”

Baekhyun grinned even wider, if that was possible. “I sure did.”

“Right on the bone, too.” As much as he was surprised, Chanyeol was also impressed. He knew that Baekhyun really loved his tattoos, especially the sunflower; he loved touching and kissing it during moments of intimacy, following the delicate linework with his fingers and mouth, but he had never before expressed an interest in getting one himself. “That must’ve hurt..”

“Hmm… kinda. It was too tiny to really hurt that much. You wanna see it?” Baekhyun finally peeled the bandage aside, revealing the words _‘beautiful boy’_ tattooed in very small black letters, stark against his pale skin. “See? It’s nothing too exciting,” he said, covering it back up again. “I’m starting small. Do you think it’s dumb? I wanted something that made me think of you.”

Chanyeol shook his head. “Of course it’s not dumb… it’s gorgeous.” He took one of Baekhyun’s hands and kissed the back of it, whispering, “anyway, you _are_ my beautiful boy.” He couldn’t wait for the tattoo to be healed so he could kiss Baekhyun there, mouthing those sweet words into his skin, right over the place where they were inked into him forever. _My beautiful boy._

 

“I’ve been thinking lately… maybe I should continue studying after all,” Baekhyun said later, while they were watching TV together; he was sprawled out on the sofa with his legs resting on top of Chanyeol’s, eating the last of the summer mangoes from the box Chanyeol’s parents had given them as a present. He plucked off a cube of sweet yellow flesh from one half of the fruit and leaned over to feed it to Chanyeol, letting him suck on his fingers — very briefly, just a taste — and then brought them to his own mouth to absently lick them clean.

“You should." Chanyeol was only half listening, distracted by what was on the TV — a rerun of some inane reality show, by the look of it. Why the hell did people find it entertaining to watch other people watching television, and why was he becoming one of those people? "I mean if it’d make you happy, you should totally go back to uni, babe. I'm making more than enough for you to cut down to part-time." He could sense that he was being watched, but he didn't turn his head until he heard the sound of the plate hitting the coffee table, and felt Baekhyun's slightly sticky fingers slipping through the spaces between his own. 

When Chanyeol finally met his eye, Baekhyun looked pensive. "You seem a little preoccupied tonight," he said in a quiet voice. "Is something up..?”

Chanyeol felt cornered for a moment. "No… nothing’s wrong. I just have a lot to think about with work and all that.”

Baekhyun nodded, squeezing his hand gently. “Okay. But you'd tell me if there _was_ something wrong, right?"

"Yeah," Chanyeol said quietly, “of course I would." Then he remembered the discussion he’d had with Sehun and Minseok about how he didn’t hide anything from Baekhyun, and felt the guilt begin to creep up on him, like acid at the back of his throat. Was it a lie by omission? Some of the things he’d heard while listening to the tapes had left him feeling unsettled, maybe even mildly disturbed; but how could he tell Baekhyun about it without having to explain what they were, where he’d found them?

“Oi,” he said, by way of changing the subject, "quit hogging that mango.”

With a naughty smile, Baekhyun put another piece of mango into his mouth, and then leaned over to kiss Chanyeol, passing it over to him with his tongue. "Happy now?" he said innocently; then he licked his fingers and laughed in that sexy, breathless way that always drove Chanyeol nuts.

"Delicious," Chanyeol whispered, his eyes still half-closed from the kiss. "You're so fucking delicious.” He took the plate away from Baekhyun, putting it back on the coffee table, and then he pulled his boyfriend closer and kissed him deeply, his heart thrilling at the sound of Baekhyun moaning softly into his mouth. His lips and tongue still tasted of the mango he'd just eaten. 

Sliding his hands up the sides of Baekhyun's body, Chanyeol pushed his shirt right up and leaned forward to kiss his stomach. Baekhyun shivered at the feeling of Chanyeol's mouth on his skin; when he couldn't take it anymore, he pushed Chanyeol down and rolled on top of him, kissing him hard. 

"I want you so bad,” he whispered, already panting into Chanyeol’s mouth. "I feel like I haven't touched you in so long.” And it was true, now that Chanyeol thought about it; he'd been so absent-minded lately that all they'd done in the past week or so was kiss occasionally, and hold each other while they slept. It made him feel guilty again, but not for very long — Baekhyun was far too good a distraction for that. He took one of Chanyeol’s hands and began softly kissing his knuckles and then each of his fingers, looking deep into his eyes as he did so. Before Baekhyun came along, Chanyeol couldn't remember anyone ever looking at him like that; not with that same innocent directness, or the purity of the love that lingered behind it. But there was something else there too, something a little more carnal; a kind of hunger that always lit a fire deep in the pit of his belly whenever he saw it.

"Come on. Let’s go to bed,” he said quietly, grabbing Baekhyun by the hand and gently pulling him away from the sofa. Baekhyun didn't argue, but Chanyeol thought he caught a glimpse of that smug little grin as he led him down the hallway. When they got to their bedroom, rather than undressing themselves (where was the fun in that?) Chanyeol undressed Baekhyun first, and then he let Baekhyun do the same for him. He smiled when Baekhyun tried very hard to keep a neutral expression, swallowing loudly as he pulled Chanyeol's underwear down over his legs; when Chanyeol stood there naked in front of him, he reached out gingerly towards the Sunnyboy tattoo, hesitating for a second before tracing it gently with his fingers.

"It's okay," Chanyeol whispered, “you can touch it… it’s healed enough now. You can even kiss it if you want.” He put a hand on top of Baekhyun's head, tenderly messing up the blue mop of hair before stroking it smooth again. That particular shade of blue — formerly a nameless hue on the spectrum — had now become a symbol of Baekhyun, of Chanyeol's love and desire for him; a blue that burned like the hottest part of a flame. Now, whenever Chanyeol happened upon that colour while he was out and about, his eyes would always single it out immediately.

With no more words exchanged between them, he lay Baekhyun down upon their bed, taking the time to touch and kiss him all over, beginning with a trail of soft kisses from his lover’s lips down to his neck and chest, kissing and sucking one nipple while rubbing the other with his fingers. He went down further still, whispering “my beautiful boy” and “tell me how I can make you feel good” into Baekhyun’s belly, rolling his tongue over his navel. But he would not kiss or touch Baekhyun in the place where he wanted it the most — except with his breath as he passed right over it — moving down to kiss his thighs instead.

“Please, Sunny,” Baekhyun whispered, already sounding breathless with longing, and Chanyeol lifted his head up to catch one sneaky hand moving downwards over his stomach. He playfully batted it away before it could reach its intended destination. “Oh no you don’t! That’s my job,” he said, laughing softly, and Baekhyun only let out a frustrated groan in reply. Chanyeol made love to him by lamplight, taking his sweet time, and when they weren’t kissing he found himself unable to look away from Baekhyun's eyes again. They often looked into each other's eyes, but maybe there was something different about his gaze this time, something more intimate and intense, because Baekhyun began to blush visibly beneath his stare. “Why are you looking at me like that?" he asked, closing his eyes when it became too much for him to bear. But he smiled anyway, even with his eyes closed, biting his lip in that sexy way that Chanyeol loved. "You're making me nervous…”

"But I love looking at you… you're so beautiful. So sexy.” Kissing along Baekhyun's collarbone, Chanyeol finished with a gentle love-bite at the base of his throat, delighting in the little gasp he earned in response. “And knowing that I turn you on really turns me on too."

"Kiss me," Baekhyun whispered, and while Chanyeol kissed him he pressed his palm against the centre of the sunflower tattoo, feeling for his heartbeat. Moved by the gesture, Chanyeol lowered his head to kiss him in the same place, the place where he loved him the most, whispering his love into the warm skin of Baekhyun's chest. "I'll take good care of you too," he said quietly, echoing Baekhyun’s earlier promise, and when he lifted his head again, he saw that Baekhyun's eyes were a little teary; he quickly blinked to hide the tears, tilting his head back against the pillow. A few of them escaped anyway, and Chanyeol brushed them away with his thumb, gently cupping Baekhyun’s face with one hand. 

"Don't hide from me, please," he whispered, leaning in until their foreheads touched, feeling the shudder of Baekhyun's breath on his lips. “Let me see you. If you won't tell me, then at least show me what you're feeling, my love.” If he couldn't get Baekhyun to open up now, in this most vulnerable state, then when could he? 

Baekhyun nodded in silence and closed his eyes, letting more tears spill out for Chanyeol to kiss away. He released another deep, shuddering breath and pulled Chanyeol's head down to kiss him again, whispering _"I love you"_ into his mouth; then he whispered something else, something that sounded like _"I've always loved you,"_ or perhaps it was _"I'll always love you"_ — Chanyeol couldn't quite tell which, but in the moment they both made sense. Being with Baekhyun consumed not only his thoughts and senses, but every part of him: heart and mind, body and soul, leaving no room for any of the things that usually haunted him. Their bed was a place where everything and nothing was sacred — a place for Baekhyun to give Chanyeol the gift of his lovely smile, and also his breathless laughter when Chanyeol accidentally let out the loud, embarrassing fart he'd been trying to hold in for the past couple of minutes. It was a place for Baekhyun to lose himself in Chanyeol's love, hiding the sounds of his pleasure in their kisses; an attempt to spare the neighbours that was only partly effective, at best. Chanyeol loved all the sounds he made, but none more than the sound of Baekhyun sighing his name — not his birth name, but _Sunny_ , the name he’d given him, a name that only belonged to the two of them. Everything about Baekhyun — his voice, the taste of his lips, the touch of his skin, the way he moved his body together with Chanyeol’s, somehow unhurried and yet with increasingly dizzying urgency — all of it was wildly intoxicating. He was the only one who could make Chanyeol feel like that; there was no room in his heart for anyone else. He already knew that he was ruined for life. 

"Tell me when you're close," he whispered; when Baekhyun could barely murmur _"almost"_ in response, Chanyeol slowed right down, drawing out their pleasure as long as he could, until neither of them could hold on any longer. He lay his head on Baekhyun's chest when they were both satisfied, feeling it gently swell with every laboured breath, and listened to his heart as he usually did. He smiled to himself at how strong it sounded. Strong and beautiful; they were the best words to describe Baekhyun's heart, and also to describe Baekhyun himself. 

"Fuck… that was incredible, though," he said, turning his head to press a soft kiss against Baekhyun's sternum. “Have you always been this good? It’s been so long now that I nearly forgot.”

Baekhyun laughed softly. “Drama queen… it’s only been about a week, I think. Maybe a little longer.”

“Still too long, if you ask me.”

“I won’t let us go that long next time, don’t worry,” Baekhyun whispered. He fell asleep later with one arm draped loosely around Chanyeol's waist. Not wanting to disturb him by moving, Chanyeol passed a sleepless hour or so, lying awake as the high gradually wore off, his mind buzzing with leftover thoughts. What exactly had he loved about Kris? A part of Chanyeol knew that he must have missed him, at some point — but he didn't know what it was he missed, or why. He couldn’t remember what they talked about, what they had in common, apart from an apparent shared love of basketball. He couldn’t remember any of the things they might have quarrelled over, if they ever did quarrel in the first place. Was it a terrible thing to feel this way about someone he must have once loved dearly, someone he’d lost forever?

Now, when he thought about romantic love or tender feelings of any sort, Baekhyun was the first and only person who came to Chanyeol's mind. He rolled over and watched Baekhyun sleep, reaching out to gently stroke his hair. And yet how much did he _really_ know about this person sleeping beside him? He used to think he knew Baekhyun well, but maybe he didn’t; physically he knew him well, but not mentally. Mentally, there was still so much to learn. He loved Baekhyun so completely; loved the way he saw the world, with so much joy and curiosity, and how he loved to share that joy with those around him. But what of his pain — all the things that haunted him, or hurt him, or scared him? Chanyeol knew there was something dark there, lurking beneath the surface; and every time he felt like he was about to unearth it at last, it seemed like Baekhyun would only bury it deeper inside himself.

Baekhyun stirred against him then, and Chanyeol gathered his warm body into his arms — that body that had become so dear to him — and held it tight. He kissed the crown of Baekhyun's head, holding his face against it. Chanyeol loved to smell him there, and if Baekhyun hadn't washed his hair that day, then so much the better. And for a second or two he pictured Kris turning restlessly in his grave, in eternal anguish at the thought of Chanyeol not remembering any such intimate details about the bond they must have once shared — little things like smelling the top of your beloved's head, and experiencing all the sweetness of life and love in that one scent, if only for a moment.

"I'm sorry," he whispered into Baekhyun's hair, though he didn't know who he was apologising to, or what he was sorry for. There were too many things he couldn't begin to name.

He felt Baekhyun stir again, the mattress shifting beneath his weight. One of his arms curled around Chanyeol’s shoulder. “Sunny," he murmured.

“Yes, my love.”

Baekhyun nuzzled into Chanyeol's neck, rubbing his nose and mouth against it. "You're not gonna sleep..?"

Chanyeol was too lost in thought to answer immediately. "I will soon. Don't worry."

"Okay." Baekhyun began kissing Chanyeol’s neck in a very slow and sleepy sort of way, and then he rolled fully on top of him, kissing his mouth instead. Chanyeol couldn't tell if he was truly awake or not; sometimes after making love he woke up in the middle of the night and wanted to do it again, voicing his desires only through kisses and touches, sleepily rubbing himself against Chanyeol's body to get him back in the mood. Chanyeol, who would often be awake anyway, never refused him. He went along with the kissing until Baekhyun began to drift off once more; his face was still buried against Chanyeol's neck, his breathing growing slower and quieter.

"I love you," he said in a soft murmur, breaking the silence at last. It seemed he was still awake after all, if only partly.

Chanyeol wrapped his arms tighter around him, and even though it was a warm night, Baekhyun didn't object. "How long will you love me, baby?" he whispered, with a soft kiss on Baekhyun's forehead.

"Forever." Even though he was half asleep, Baekhyun responded without hesitation, brushing his lips against Chanyeol's pulse. Then his tongue darted out to lick it, making Chanyeol's breath catch in his throat for a second.

"Me too," Chanyeol said, and hoped that it would be true. Maybe he had once told Kris the same thing, and he wondered if his heart would forget such a promise, even if his head did. He was quiet for a moment, stroking Baekhyun's hair, and then he said, "we’ll have to wash these sheets again tomorrow, hey."

Baekhyun laughed softly. "Tell me about it. Goodnight, Sunny.” He nuzzled Chanyeol's neck a bit more, letting out a happy little sigh, and then he went back to sleep.

 

 

* * * * *

 

 

The next morning, Chanyeol woke up to Baekhyun still snoring peacefully beside him. He yawned, feeling warm and happy, and rolled over a little closer to watch him sleep.

“I can’t wait for you to wake up,” he said quietly, moving Baekhyun's fringe away from his eyes. “So I can kiss you silly.”

“ _Mmmph_ ," Baekhyun mumbled into the pillow. He rolled over to face the other way, and Chanyeol cuddled up to him from behind, trailing kisses across one of his shoulders. 

“I ‘ _mmmph_ ' you too," he whispered, smiling against Baekhyun's skin. "I ' _mmmph_ ' you more than anyone else I've ever ' _mmmph’d_ ’…”

Baekhyun awoke at last, turning around to blink at Chanyeol through heavy eyelids. “Mmm. What time is it..?" he asked, his voice croaky with sleep.

Chanyeol reached over to the nightstand for his phone, making a show of checking the time. "It's sexy-time," he said. "Five minutes _past_ sexy-time, to be precise... so we'd better get to it, I reckon.”

Baekhyun groaned at the silly joke, only to end up laughing at it instead. “Fair go… I only just woke up,” he said, but Chanyeol knew he wouldn’t need much convincing. Slow, sleepy morning sex was one of Baekhyun’s favourite things in the whole world.

"C'mon," he whispered, now kissing the nape of Baekhyun’s neck, which he knew always turned him on. “Let's get one more go out of these sheets before we chuck ‘em in the wash.”

Baekhyun laughed again, in that husky, sexy way that Chanyeol loved. "What have I done?" he murmured in reply, more as an aside to himself than in response to Chanyeol. "I've created a monster.” 

 

But he gave in, of course, as Chanyeol knew he would. They made love slowly, with Chanyeol on his back and Baekhyun on top of him, moving to a lazy Sunday morning beat that only the two of them could hear. Chanyeol had never seen him looking so incredible; the morning sun shining through the curtains formed a golden halo around his head, and made his skin and hair look like they were glowing. This time Baekhyun wasn't shy about looking into Chanyeol's eyes; his own gaze was so full of love and desire that it was Chanyeol who almost felt the need to look away, for once, but he couldn’t. 

“Put your hands on me, love,” Baekhyun whispered, “I love it when you touch me.” He smiled and bit his lip, rolling his head back and moaning softly when Chanyeol gladly reached out to touch him, all the while whispering about how sexy and perfect he was — sliding his hands up over Baekhyun's thighs, caressing his tummy, holding his rolling hips to guide his pace and keep him steady. The greater freedom to touch him almost made up for the lack of kissing, Chanyeol thought. He loved it like this — loved the view of Baekhyun and his gorgeous body, the beautiful smile with which he rewarded Chanyeol’s constant praise. What a privilege it was to witness something so intimate, but even more so to be a part of it; to offer himself up for Baekhyun’s pleasure, and see the rewards of that pleasure unfolding before him. To feel everything his lover was feeling, exactly as he felt it.

The rest of the morning was spent cuddled up under the covers, kissing in a sweet and unhurried way, their hands roaming slowly over warm skin. Chanyeol let Baekhyun touch his face, smiling at the wonder and adoration in his eyes, and tenderly kissed any fingers that ventured close to his mouth. After such a perfect start to their Sunday, it would have been only too easy to stay in bed the whole day, but Chanyeol knew he should really take the van out for a drive. "Better make the most of these last summer days," he whispered, kissing Baekhyun's closed eyelids — naturally he was starting to doze off again. “They’ll be gone very soon.”

Baekhyun yawned and snuggled up closer to him, rubbing one of Chanyeol's legs with his foot; it seemed like his feet were always cold, no matter the weather, and it made Chanyeol shiver a little. "Last year, summer didn't end until like, April or May," he replied sleepily. "I think we've still got a while yet.” Still, he wasn't against the idea. "How about somewhere different this time? I know a good place we can go."

“You always know a good place we can go... you’re by far the best GPS I’ve ever had. And you've never once told me to drive into a lake, like my old Navman did.”

Baekhyun laughed at that. “Useful, handsome _and_ good in bed… you really struck gold when you met me, Sunny.” He was quiet for a moment, and then he said, “we should drive down to Jervis one more time, too, before summer really does die. And then maybe we can stop off at Nowra on the way home. You still need to meet _my_ parents, you know.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Chanyeol whispered, kissing him again.

 

At Baekhyun's suggestion they drove out to Seven Mile beach, parking the van near the entrance closest to where the flags were set up. They worked the crowd there until interest began to wane, and then took an early afternoon break to grab something to eat, lazing around on the sand for a bit. Maybe it was the glorious weather — hot but still breezy — or the front-row view of the sparkling ocean, or the lingering afterglow of the morning's bedroom fun… maybe it was all of these things, but somehow it felt to Chanyeol like they were two newlyweds on their honeymoon, and he could feel himself falling in love with Baekhyun all over again, falling so hard it hurt — glancing over at him occasionally to see the sun shining on his lovely face while he looked out pensively at the water, seemingly unaware he was being watched. He wondered if Baekhyun ever looked at him the same way, when he wasn't aware of it, and felt that same fluttering warmth in his chest and stomach.

Baekhyun got to his feet then and pulled off his t-shirt, dumping it on the sand next to Chanyeol. "I'm gonna go put my feet in for a bit. Wanna come?”

Chanyeol shrugged. "I'm not fussed... maybe later. You go." He watched Baekhyun run over towards the water. Now that his mind had a chance to wander, he realised he'd barely thought about anything else since yesterday, mainly due to his rude boyfriend constantly distracting him with his body — not that he would ever complain about that. But inevitably his mind returned to the tapes, and Lakuna, and then he became lost in thought again. He couldn't tell Baekhyun about this strange discovery — how would he explain himself? More importantly, what would Baekhyun say? He would surely think Chanyeol had finally cracked it from a chronic lack of sleep. Even Chanyeol wasn't entirely convinced that he hadn't imagined the whole thing, but those tapes existed as proof — not that it wasn't all some kind of weird hoax, but that the discovery itself had not been a dream.

Was it really possible for someone to have their memories of an entire period — or an entire _person_ — erased forever? Surely it couldn’t be. Chanyeol had tried to read up on it more, and had found something about scientists managing to successfully erase specific memories through some kind of experiment using snails, but that wasn't enough to go on. 

"Are you okay?" Baekhyun asked, bursting the bubble of Chanyeol’s daydream as he sat down on the sand next to him. “Brrr. It's colder in there than I thought.”

“I’m fine,” Chanyeol answered belatedly. "Just doing a bit of thinking."

"You're doing a _lot_ of thinking lately," Baekhyun said, looking at him with an expression of mock suspicion. "I don't trust a man who thinks too much.”

Chanyeol pouted. "What's that supposed to mean?!”

"Nothing, I'm just stirring. You know, since you're so easily stirred and all.” Baekhyun didn't push him any further, although as soon as they returned to the van, he dug out a Gaytime from the freezer and held it out towards Chanyeol, waving it about and grinning at him. "A Gaytime for your thoughts..?"

“Nah. But give me a kiss and I'll think about it," Chanyeol said, closing his eyes in anticipation. When Baekhyun's warm lips met his, he leaned into the kiss, sighing into his mouth. He pulled away and moved Baekhyun's shirt aside at the shoulder to kiss him there, brushing his lips against soft skin, smelling the sea on him. "If this wasn't a food service area, I'd be tempted to have you right here," he whispered, and lifting Baekhyun's shirt, he kneeled down to kiss his stomach instead. "I'd cover your beautiful body in melted chocolate and sprinkles, and then I’d lick it all off." He paused for a second, rethinking his choices. "Actually, fuck the sprinkles — cookie crumbs all the way."

"You'd turn me into a giant Gaytime and eat me." Baekhyun chuckled softly, and Chanyeol felt the vibration of it through the skin of his tummy. "You weirdo."

“What can I say? It’s my ultimate fantasy,” Chanyeol said, hugging Baekhyun's waist as he continued to kiss him. "Maybe when we go home tonight, we can have a real Gaytime together. Except this time, we'll both be naked."

Baekhyun let out an exasperated groan. "Don't... you'll give me a boner just thinking about it." He turned his head, looking out the window. "There are still a few kids running around out there, and they really don't need to see that."

 

They flirted with each other for the rest of the day: just little things, like secretly playing with each other's hands while they stood at the window seeing to their customers, and whispering what they wanted to do to each other while one of them was in the middle of serving, causing great frustration to whoever happened to be the victim. By the time they got home, Chanyeol had lost interest in Lakuna altogether; all he wanted to do was be with Baekhyun — not even to have sex, but just to spend time with him. He felt like he had really missed simply enjoying his boyfriend's company lately, as they ended up doing that night – sitting next to each other on the couch, he in his worn-out old hoodie and Baekhyun in that huge Silverchair t-shirt with the holes in it, two mugs of hot tea on the coffee table beside them. They were each reading a book, but content in their independent togetherness, quoting to each other occasionally to share the experience. Nights like that, while a little rarer these days, were still Chanyeol's favourite. He couldn't even bring himself to be apprehensive about the beginning of a new working week the next day. 

As usual, Baekhyun sat up with his back against the armrest, his bare legs resting on top of Chanyeol's lap. "Wendy Cope is a wonderful poet," he said with a contented sigh, breaking the comfortable silence. "Listen to this little gem:

 

_‘At lunchtime I bought a huge orange –_

_The size of it made us all laugh._

_I peeled it and shared it with Robert and Dave –They got quarters and I had a half._

 

_And that orange, it made me so happy,_

_As ordinary things often do_

_Just lately. The shopping. A walk in the park._

_This is peace and contentment. It’s new._

 

_The rest of the day was quite easy._

_I did all the jobs on my list_

_And enjoyed them and had some time over._

_I love you. I’m glad I exist.' "_

 

When the poem was finished, Chanyeol was so touched by it that he immediately leaned over to kiss Baekhyun on the lips. "That was beautiful," he said. "Sweet and simple, but heartfelt. I loved it."

"It's lovely, isn't it? It made me think of you." Baekhyun smiled at him, scrunching his nose up until his eyes wrinkled gorgeously at the corners. "Now read me something from yours... try to find a part that reminds you of me." He always seemed like a different person when they talked about literature; more mature, somehow, as though he had gained a wealth of wisdom and life experience vicariously through every book he'd read. He loved books so much that it left Chanyeol with no other choice but to love them even more himself. 

"Alright.” Chanyeol flipped through his book for a moment, remembering a passage he had particularly enjoyed earlier, which he read aloud: _" ‘I could melt still at the memory of his back, when I pulled his shirt over his head, and pressed kisses on his shoulder blades and neck. No one ever looked nicer from behind. His back was the tapered shield, the figure of my love for him, too simple, too confounding to be put into words.’ ”_

Baekhyun closed his eyes, as though the words themselves actively brought him immense enjoyment. "Gorgeous," he said quietly. "I really do love The Folding Star. It’s so beautifully written.”

"It's very good,” Chanyeol agreed, “I’m really enjoying it.” It was rare for him to not enjoy a book that Baekhyun had recommended.

Baekhyun nodded and went back to his poems. "You know, I'm not wearing anything under this shirt," he said, very casually, as though they were still making normal conversation. When Chanyeol took the bait and glanced over at him, Baekhyun slowly lifted one knee until the t-shirt rode up over his thighs, confirming that it was true. He continued to sit with his knee drawn up like that, his legs slightly parted, but made no move to cover himself up again. He really could be shameless, sometimes.

Chanyeol swallowed, but he continued reading as though unaffected. If Baekhyun was going to tease him like that, then he would go one better by making him wait. He went on reading happily until he could sense Baekhyun getting antsy, wriggling around a little in his seat. Then he leaned over to put his book on the coffee table.

“Well… are you gonna give me what I want, or will I just have to take care of myself?” he said at last, which was the last straw as far as Chanyeol was concerned. 

"Alright," he growled, throwing himself on top of a wickedly laughing Baekhyun. "You asked for it..."

Baekhyun only continued to laugh, in that infuriatingly adorable way that kept Chanyeol from ever being annoyed at him; at least not for very long. "Twice in one day, you lucky boy... told you I wouldn't make you wait again, didn't I..?" He lifted his head from where Chanyeol had pushed him down into the sofa, and slowly licked a wet trail up along his throat, making him shiver.

"Quiet, you." Chanyeol yanked the old t-shirt up over Baekhyun's head and threw it on the floor. Moving his lips to Baekhyun's ear, he whispered, "what do you want me to do to you?”

Baekhyun looked up at him and licked his lips. "I only want you," he said quietly. "As for the rest... I’ll let you surprise me."

“I want you, too. Right here and now." Chanyeol kissed Baekhyun slowly on the mouth, opening him up with his tongue, and Baekhyun let out a soft groan in response, already breathing heavily into their kisses. 

"Hang on," he whispered, "I'll go get the—”

“No, _I’ll_ go. You wait here." Chanyeol kissed him one more time, quick but sweet. "Keep it hot for me, babe. I'll be right back."  He hurried into the bedroom and pulled open the drawers of his nightstand, rummaging around until he found lube and a box of Trojans. The box was empty. "Shit." He pushed the contents of the drawer around, in case a stray condom that had fallen out of the box should surface, but he came up with nothing. 

He went around to check the nightstand on Baekhyun’s side of the bed instead, in case he kept his own stash in there. Looking through all his stuff — books, pens, headache tablets, other miscellaneous junk — he found no condoms. There was, however, a notebook in there: mint green with tiny hedgehogs on it. Cute, Chanyeol thought, smiling to himself. Suddenly struck by curiosity, he gently flipped it open, hoping for a quick stickybeak into what could be the deepest thoughts of his mysterious lover. A bunch of loose papers immediately fell out onto the floor.

Swearing under his breath, he kneeled down to pick them up, and then he saw what they were: pencil sketches of someone who looked a lot like Baekhyun, asleep. A whole pile of them. Chanyeol frowned. Had _he_ done these? The drawing style was similar to his own, but he didn't remember ever using paper like that. Why did Baekhyun have them hidden in his drawer? Then he found another thick wad of folded papers. At first glance, they appeared to be patient records: there were notes on brain scans, test results, other documents whose contents he couldn't grasp the meaning of. He was about to put the pile of strange documents away when his gaze landed on something else inside the drawer, and he reached out to pick it up. It was a cassette tape, with a name and a date marked on the label. Chanyeol blinked at the name to see it better. Then he narrowed his eyes, closed them, shook his head, blinked at it again. He froze. His heart began to pound inside his chest, so hard that it made him feel dizzy.

He wasn’t just seeing things; the name written there was _Chanyeol Park._

"What's taking so long?" Baekhyun whined loudly from the other room, snapping him out of his daze.

"Coming!" Chanyeol replied quickly. _Shit,_ he thought. _Shit shit shit._ What was he going to do? He had to make sure it didn't look like he'd been going through Baekhyun's stuff. 

“That's exactly what I'll be doing, with or without you, if you don't get your arse over here very soon!”

"I'm just having a bit of trouble finding condoms, babe. I didn’t realise I was all out,” Chanyeol said, hoping to buy himself a few more seconds. It wasn't a lie, anyhow. He felt sick and confused, and yet strangely exhilarated at the same time. He needed — _needed_ — to find a way to listen to that tape — but how? And when?

Now he would need to pretend that everything was fine, or Baekhyun would know something was up. He would still be on the sofa where Chanyeol left him, naked and frustrated; Chanyeol’s mind was reeling so much that the mental image did little to rekindle his excitement.

"Look in my wallet, I think I still have a couple in there. It's inside my backpack. You'll find it hanging on the back of the door." Baekhyun groaned in exasperation, in such an exaggerated way that Chanyeol heard it clearly from the bedroom. "Come on, Sunny… don’t make a poor man beg.”

Normally Chanyeol would have loved making Baekhyun beg, but this wasn't the time. He fumbled with the contents of the drawer, moving things around a little to make them look like they hadn’t been disturbed. Right now, he had a needy boyfriend to take care of; anything else would just have to come later.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next few chapters are a complete mess still, so updates from now on will possibly be a few weeks apart. Sorry :( hope you've been enjoying it so far tho
> 
> P.S. Excerpts from the books Chanyeol and Baekhyun are reading in the last scene are taken from Two Cures For Love by Wendy Cope and The Folding Star by Alan Hollinghurst, respectively.
> 
> Playlist for Chapter 7:
> 
> 1\. [When The Sun Hits - Slowdive](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKYY0IlTMw4)  
> 2\. [Monsters - Something For Kate](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lDV4rawD5M)  
> 3\. [Move Together - James Bay](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhWTREgDAxc)  
> 4\. [Baby Can I Hold You - Tracy Chapman](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzIE3mRFypQ)  
> 5\. [Like Clockwork - Queens of the Stone Age](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KBRIalvTtQ)


	8. Everything is falling, dear

 

 

______________________________

 

 _January 12_ _ th_

_You’re cuddled up next to me right now. There is a little bruise on your neck that I made with my mouth earlier, and I’m already dying to kiss you again — but I’d hate to wake you up, so I won’t. Sometimes I do lean over and place a tiny peck on your lips while you’re sleeping, and hope that you’ll feel it in your dreams. Occasionally, in mine, I can feel you kissing me too._

_You’re smiling in your sleep today, which I haven’t seen you do in a long while, and I’m actually really glad I couldn’t sleep tonight because otherwise I would have missed it. You look happy, just like you used to, and I’m reminded once more of how beautiful my love looks on you, of how you always wear it so well. I know I’ll never find another soul who wears it better._

 

______________________________

 

 

 

 

When Chanyeol returned to the living room, Baekhyun was still perched, completely naked, on one end of the sofa. “Is everything alright?” he asked, and to Chanyeol’s relief he looked more concerned than angry. “You were gone for ages…”

Chanyeol sat down next to him. “I’m fine,” he said quietly.

Baekhyun frowned. “Are you sure..?”

Chanyeol nodded and smiled to show that he was, in fact, perfectly fine. He took the condom he’d found in Baekhyun’s wallet and waved it in front of his boyfriend’s nose. “Mission accomplished,” he said, slipping the little silver packet back inside his pocket, and then he cradled Baekhyun’s chin in his hands and kissed him. His mind wasn’t reeling anymore, he told himself. His heart wasn’t pounding — he was calm. Everything was as it should be. Nothing had changed from ten minutes ago until now. He was still Chanyeol, and Baekhyun was still Baekhyun, the man he loved, the love of his life. Nothing was different. Nothing had happened.

“Come on, then,” he whispered against Baekhyun’s lips, before grabbing both of his hands and hauling him up to his feet. He had a feeling of deja vu — it was much like the previous night, kissing on the couch and then eventually leading Baekhyun over to the bedroom. But he hadn’t known then what he did now; did that knowledge mean that he was a different person? He tried to shake the thought away before it could lay down any more roots.

 

By the time they actually got in bed, though, the mood seemed to have died away a little. Baekhyun lay beneath Chanyeol, stiff as a board and looking slightly bemused, waiting for him to do something.  “Sunny, are you _sure_ everything’s okay?” he asked.

Chanyeol nodded, even though he really meant the opposite. He wanted to look into Baekhyun’s eyes, but he couldn’t. On a normal day, just the mere thought of sex with Baekhyun was enough to get him in the mood, but that was before he’d found… what he’d just found. Even if the tape _wasn’t_ a Lakuna tape, the simple fact that it had his name written on it and was hidden amongst Baekhyun’s things was disturbing enough. All he could do now was wonder how much he really knew about this man he shared a home and a bed and a life with, and how much he didn’t know. Should he feel bad or betrayed that Baekhyun probably knew something he didn’t, something important — something he was clearly keeping from him? Was there an explanation for it all — something much more innocent than he imagined — that Baekhyun would willingly tell him if he asked? 

These thoughts were soon chased away by the sound of Baekhyun’s voice. His hand moved up to touch Chanyeol’s face as he murmured, almost shyly, “aren’t you going to kiss me, then?”

Chanyeol nodded absently, but his mind was still racing, and he was too distracted to lean in closer. With a little grunt of impatience, Baekhyun lifted himself up and did it instead, pulling Chanyeol’s head down until their lips met. Chanyeol closed his eyes automatically when he felt Baekhyun’s mouth on his, but they still darted around beneath his eyelids. He couldn’t keep them still. They were searching, looking towards that drawer in the nightstand and what was hidden within it. How could he think about anything else?

“Please,” Baekhyun whispered into his mouth. He moved feverishly beneath Chanyeol’s body, trying to create the friction he craved. “Haven’t I waited long enough..?”

Chanyeol had no idea how he was going to manage when he could barely keep hold of a single thought. “Are you sure you don’t wanna just… I dunno, make out instead?”

“Huh?” Baekhyun’s reply came with a warm, wet kiss beneath Chanyeol’s ear. His breath on Chanyeol’s skin made him shiver. “But I really want you.”

“Alright,” Chanyeol whispered, “I just thought you might be a bit tired, that’s all.” He just had to man up and get on with it, he told himself — keep his mind on track as best he could. Baekhyun at least deserved that much from him. He wouldn’t have to wait for too long, either, because Baekhyun would probably fall asleep immediately afterwards, as he usually did. Then Chanyeol could finally sneak off with that tape, and listen to whatever was on it, and put this whole unsettling situation to rest.

And it wouldn’t be too hard to get in the mood again, he reassured himself. All it would take was touching him: sliding both his palms beneath Baekhyun’s hips to angle them upwards, kneading the small of his back to soothe him. Leaning forward to kiss and whisper into his lover’s belly. Skimming his fingertips down over the soft skin of his thighs, pushing them gently apart and making himself at home in the space between them. What a miracle it was, that body; sometimes he still had trouble believing it was real, that it existed right there beneath his hands, shadowed and beautiful in the dim light. How unlikely it seemed that, out of all the people on Earth, this one wanted to be with _him_ and no one else. For a moment all he could do was stare at Baekhyun in silent wonder, overwhelmed by the sheer improbability of it all.

“Sunny, what are you waiting for?” The plea in Baekhyun’s voice sent a fresh jolt down Chanyeol’s spine.

“Shh. Let me warm you up a little,” Chanyeol whispered. In truth, he was the one who still needed warming up, though he hoped Baekhyun couldn’t tell.

“Lost the urge, huh?” Baekhyun sighed. His body went slightly limp, like he was deflating.

“No, of course not… if you’re still in the mood, then so am I.”

Baekhyun looked up at Chanyeol with his lips pressed together, apparently unconvinced. “Are you sure? Because we don’t _have_ to, you know. If you’ve changed your mind…”

He’d definitely noticed something was up — Chanyeol could see it there, plainly written on his face, and he immediately felt a pang of guilt. But then of course he’d noticed, because Baekhyun noticed everything. There was no escaping those watchful eyes.

Chanyeol paused to murmur into a kiss against his neck, leaving a trail of them along his shoulder. “I haven’t changed my mind. I want you too, babe,” he whispered. “I _need_ you.” It was easier to keep his mind from straying when he lifted his head and looked at Baekhyun, into his eyes, and actually thought about what he said; how he really meant every word. Even if everything was about to change forever, in this moment he still loved Baekhyun. He still craved him.

Baekhyun held Chanyeol’s gaze for a moment. Tentatively, he cradled his chin in one hand, drawing him in until they were close enough to start kissing again, very slowly, their mouths opening up to share each other’s breath. This was the best thing he could have done, because there was no better way to empty the mind than kissing Baekhyun — he made it impossible to think about anything else. Chanyeol loved to hear all the different sounds he could coax out while kissing that pretty mouth, so soft and warm and yielding; he could never get enough of Baekhyun’s kisses. Sometimes he wondered about the look Baekhyun would get in his eyes at times like these: glazed and dreamy, and yet strangely present. Did Baekhyun see the same thing when he looked at him? As if to silence his whirring brain, Baekhyun reached up to touch Chanyeol’s face again. He moved his hand over to Chanyeol’s mouth, prompting him to kiss and suck the tips of his fingers, closing his eyes with pleasure when he did so.

Chanyeol didn’t know why it came out of him then: the urge to sing a few lines of an old Nick Cave song he loved, low and sweet with his lips pressed against Baekhyun’s ear — _‘it’s just history repeating itself, and babe, you turn me on’_. It took Baekhyun a moment to react, his blissful expression briefly eclipsed by a quick burst of laughter. Oh, his laughter; the sound of it always made something blossom inside Chanyeol’s soul, but especially now. All he could offer in return for all the joy Baekhyun gave him was his love. How he adored this feeling: the two of them chasing the same glorious high, but trying to hold it off at the same time, enjoying each other for as long as they could.

“You okay, babe?” Now Chanyeol could barely speak, let alone think.

“Yeah, I’m good.” Like Chanyeol, Baekhyun was too far gone to say much. “Wanna kiss you,” he whispered, and when Chanyeol leaned down so he could do this, he felt Baekhyun suck on his tongue for a moment, making him gasp. When he pulled away, Baekhyun’s eyes were shining with tears again, more tears that Chanyeol couldn’t explain, but he needed no explanation; he was too preoccupied with kissing that little smile on his lover’s lips, kissing it over and over. Baekhyun laughed again while they kissed, a gorgeous sound. It soon melted into a groan that trembled all through his body, and left him breathing hard into Chanyeol’s open mouth, his fingers clutching at the hair on the back of his head.

 

“For a moment there you looked like you were about to cry again,” Chanyeol said while they were cuddling afterwards. He couldn’t help smiling, and for a little while, at least, the tape hidden in the drawer of the nightstand was forgotten. “You sweet thing… do I really make you that emotional?” 

“Excuse me, I did not!” Baekhyun sounded playfully indignant at first, but then he covered his face with his hands. He was clearly embarrassed, and would only peer at Chanyeol through the gaps between his fingers. “Oh no, did I really..?” 

“There were definitely a few tears.” Laughing softly, Chanyeol moved Baekhyun’s hands aside to see his face. “Don’t be shy… there’s no need.”

Baekhyun swatted him away. “Shut up,” he said, pouting.

“It’s normal to have feelings, babe. You can open up to me once in a while, you know.”

Baekhyun mumbled something and rolled over, burying his face in his pillow. “I know that. Don’t patronise me.”

“I’m not. I like it when you let yourself be vulnerable around me, that’s all. I think it’s beautiful.” Chanyeol snuggled up against his boyfriend’s back, holding him tight around the waist. “I think _you’re_ beautiful,” he added, finishing the thought with a soft kiss on Baekhyun’s shoulder. “And sexy. And hot. And did I mention sexy..?” 

“You did.” Baekhyun let out a little hum of amusement; now his shyness seemed to have evaporated. “It’s really hard for me to open up, sometimes. We all have things that are hard to talk about… stuff we’d rather forget,” he said quietly. “Like that song you were singing at me earlier, you corny arsehole.”

Chanyeol laughed. “Not a Nick Cave fan, then. Noted for future reference.”

“That’s not it, really. It’s just…” Baekhyun began, and then he sighed so quietly that it was almost inaudible. “Never mind.”

Chanyeol was tempted to ask him to elaborate, but he didn’t want to ruin the mood. “Well, it’s true. You _do_ turn me on,” he whispered. “And I’m so in love with you that sometimes it makes me ache physically. I don’t really know why… maybe I just feel it too deeply.”

Baekhyun turned around to look at him then, and there was something unreadable about his gaze, something mysterious but tender. Instead of speaking, he moved over to kiss Chanyeol again, a soft and lingering caress of his lips, breathing into his mouth all the while. He rolled on top of Chanyeol, still kissing him, before moving down slowly to kiss his body; and Chanyeol let him, because for now he needed Baekhyun’s soft lips on his skin — needed the feeling of it to push out of his mind what he had seen earlier, something he still couldn’t be sure he had actually seen in the first place. Seeing was believing for those who had the luxury of getting enough rest, but for those who didn’t, the mind deprived of sleep could sometimes take liberties. He would happily hold on to this possibility, however tenuous, until he could be sure that he wasn’t mistaken.

And for a while, at least, it worked. Chanyeol often thought he could get lost in one of Baekhyun’s kisses for hours without realising it. He loved the way Baekhyun lingered after each kiss; how he would hang on to his next breath so that they could share it, breathing in and out together. That tiny inhale of anticipation just before their lips touched, and those little sighs in between each separation and reunion of their mouths — a sound that communicated love, desire, satisfaction, all without the need for words. How often did he really take the time to savour all these lovely little details? And how could he believe that Baekhyun would ever hide anything from him, or wilfully hurt him? He knew that Baekhyun really loved him — not only because he said it often, but because of how he acted, all those ways in which he chose to show it. Baekhyun loved him with every breath, with everything he was; a love that felt beyond the reach of time. It was unthinkable to Chanyeol that Kris could ever have loved him in the same way Baekhyun did. This wasn’t mere speculation, but a soul-deep feeling that he could not shake.

But then, why was he thinking about Kris again — why now? And one by one, more intrusive thoughts kept coming. What had his kisses felt like? What was sleeping with him like? Did they fuck, or make love, or both? Was he a cuddler too? It felt wrong to think about it while he was in bed with Baekhyun — while Baekhyun was still kissing him, no less — but he couldn’t help it.

 

“Time to sleep,” Baekhyun said at last, losing half his words in a yawn. He kissed Chanyeol’s ear as he whispered into it. “I really love sleeping with you… I’ve never told you that, have I? But I mean it literally; I just love being asleep next to you.”

Chanyeol sighed. “Wish I could just switch it on and off like you can.” He felt like he was in some kind of role-play, acting out a version of himself. It was a strange, surreal, detached sort of feeling; pretending to talk about their problems before going to sleep, like any normal couple. Acting like everything was the same as it always was.

“Just relax, babe. Empty your mind,” Baekhyun whispered. He had one hand resting on Chanyeol's hipbone, lovingly stroking the place where he knew the Sunnyboy tattoo would be. Then he gave Chanyeol’s pubes a cheeky tug, which he sometimes did for a laugh whenever he let them grow out too long. Chanyeol didn’t mind it, really, though he could never retaliate because Baekhyun always shaved right down to the skin. 

“That’s some lush forestry you’ve got there,” Baekhyun murmured into the back of his neck, chuckling around a wet kiss against the nape of it. Chanyeol let out a little snort before smacking the wandering hand away.

 

At last, Baekhyun’s breathing slowed down as he began to doze off, and Chanyeol rolled over to watch him sleep for a while, trying to ignore the growing feeling of unease in his stomach. Now that the warm, sleepy buzz of satisfaction was gone, there was a vague clawing sensation in its place, like the early stages of dread. His head began to fill up with unwelcome thoughts again. When he heard Baekhyun start to snore, he quietly moved away from him, swinging both legs over the edge of the bed, and sat there with his head in his hands for a minute or two, mentally preparing himself. He coughed loudly a few times, just to test the waters. When Baekhyun made no movement in response to the noise, he turned around and patted him lightly on the cheek. 

"Baek," he whispered. Still no reaction. As expected, he was out like a light. Chanyeol stared into the childlike honesty of that sleeping face: the closed eyes, the slack mouth. How could there be anything to hide there? Maybe if he waited long enough, the truth would just fall out on its own. Baekhyun did sometimes talk in his sleep, even though it was usually gibberish.

Or maybe nothing would come out but nonsense. Maybe a string of nonsense was all he could hope for. Maybe that was all this was: nonsense and needless paranoia.

He returned his attention to the task at hand. He didn't _have_ to do this right now, he tried to reason with himself. Could they not remain in this state of inertia where nothing was wrong, where all was as it should be? But it was too late for that, because he was already tilted off-axis, spinning toward the ground, and he couldn't wait — he _couldn’t_ wait. He had to know, in much the same way that he needed to breathe. The slightly nauseated feeling in his stomach began to intensify.

 

After picking up his clothes from the floor and throwing them on, Chanyeol tiptoed around to Baekhyun's side of the bed. Kneeling in front of the nightstand, he opened the drawer as quietly as he could. It creaked anyway. He felt his heart pounding in his throat. Baekhyun didn't move a muscle, and so he swallowed and carried on. He rummaged blindly, feeling around until his fingers touched the little notebook and the cassette tape, sliding them closer to the front of the drawer. He took them out and eased the drawer shut. So far, so good. Then  Baekhyun mumbled something while he was making his way towards the bedroom door, and Chanyeol went rigid with the spoils of his mission in his hands, rooted to the spot like some kind of ridiculous statue. But it quickly became apparent that Baekhyun was only talking in his sleep again, and he quickly left the room before anything else could happen.

 

Closing the front door quietly behind him, he hurried down into the street. The night air was fresh and cool, a welcome change from the warm nights they’d been having recently. Shivering a little, he walked over to his car and got inside. By now his heart was beating so hard that it seemed to send tremors all through his body; for some reason he felt paranoid, so he locked all the doors.

Now that he was alone, he began to freely flick through the bundle of papers that were folded inside the notebook. He found small poems, little love letters, and dated journal entries written in a neat cursive hand that uncannily resembled his own. There were drawings of a boy who looked strikingly similar to Baekhyun — mostly in repose, but also some where he was awake. There was a sketch of him naked and sprawled out on a bed, his gaze smouldering up at Chanyeol from the paper. Others were of separate body parts: two eyes, and a pair of parted lips. A beautifully shaded ear, like a cross-section of a seashell, with that same fleshy protuberance on the outer edge of the cartilage that Baekhyun had. A hand — clearly Baekhyun’s hand because of the large, distinctive mole beneath the thumbnail. Chanyeol was not particularly good at drawing hands, and it seemed whoever had done these drawings wasn’t great at it either; but apart from this, the sketches were all surprisingly lifelike. Could he really have drawn so well?

And then there was the writing. When had he written all these little notes — if indeed they _had_ been written by him? He skimmed through a couple of them. Each was dated with the month and day, but no year, and addressed to no one in particular. There was only an unnamed 'you.'

Chanyeol put the bundle of papers and the notebook aside on the passenger seat. With slightly shaking hands, he took the cassette tape with his name written on it, and pushed it into the slot, rewound it to the beginning and pressed play. There were several seconds of nothing but crackling static before he heard any sound — first, an unfamiliar voice asking someone to introduce themselves. And then:

 

_“My name is Chanyeol Park, and I’m here because I would like to erase the death of my best friend, Kris Wu, from my memory.”_

 

Chanyeol stopped the tape. That was his name, and his voice — there was no longer any room for doubt. But he had referred to Kris as his best friend, not his boyfriend. That couldn’t be right… but then it was possible that they were no longer dating at the time the recording was made. He took a deep breath to calm himself, pressed play again and closed his eyes, settling in to listen.

 

_“Kris tragically died in an accident a couple of years ago. I was there when he died, which naturally makes the memory of his death especially traumatic for me. I met him at high school, where we played basketball together, and we gradually grew closer from there. I loved Kris very much. He was my best friend, and I trusted him with my life. He was a great, dependable guy in every sense, but sometimes he had a bit of a problem controlling himself around alcohol. When we went out or got invited to parties, I often had to rein him in when he got a bit too wild, which occasionally created tension between us. So we went to a friend's house party one evening, and by the end of the night, he was smashed beyond comprehension. I was a bit drunk too, so we walked to Fairy Meadow to catch the train home. We were up on the walkway over the tracks, and he said he felt like he was going to spew, so he walked over to the railing and leaned against it. He leaned further over, and then he started retching over the side, and while doing this, he fell. He was a really tall guy, and he was very drunk, and the railing wasn't that high… I’m sorry.”_

_“It's fine,”_ the other voice said, _“just take your time.”_

_“I have a really hard time just thinking about this next memory, let alone talking about it…”_

 

Chanyeol quickly pressed the stop button again. Maybe it was too much; maybe it was better if he didn't know, if he remained blissfully ignorant. Here in his grasp was something that pointed to a whole missing chapter of his life; at one time, he had clearly chosen to eliminate that particular chapter for a specific reason — a traumatic reason — and now he was about to undo it all. 

But he'd already come this far… how could he stop now? His finger hovered over the play button for a second, trembling in mid-air, and then he pushed it.

 

_“Whenever you're ready. Or do you want to finish up for today and come back another time?”_

_“No… I need to do this. It's been haunting me for long enough.”_

_“Well, if you change your mind at any time, let me know and I’ll stop recording. But it’s important that you tell me absolutely every detail you can recall that surrounds that particular memory, otherwise we won’t be able to target it effectively during the erasure process. Will that be alright?”_

 

There was a brief pause before Chanyeol heard his own voice again. _“Yes, I think so. Anyway, after he fell, I bolted down the stairs to get to the platform. He'd landed right on the tracks, and I was beside myself, because the next train to Dapto was due in less than ten minutes. I was yelling for help, but it was well after midnight and there was no one else around. The place was deserted. The ticket window was shuttered up. I had no one to help me, but I figured I still had some time to try and drag him to safety. I hopped down from the platform onto the tracks, where he was lying face down, and tried to move him away. Then I heard an announcement over the speaker: 'the next train to arrive on platform two does not stop at this station. Please stand clear.’_

_“I heard it before I saw it; it wasn't our train, but an express service passing through Fairy Meadow on its way towards Wollongong.  Even from a distance, I could tell it was coming in way too fast to be able to stop in time. By this time, I was in a full-blown panic. I tried my hardest to haul Kris up, but he was a very heavy man, taller even than me. He was unconscious, a dead weight. I remember his hair being sticky and matted with blood from a wound on his head, and it was all over my hands. I only managed to drag him partially off the rails when the train driver blasted the horn, and I leapt out of the way just before it came through, diving into the space between the two tracks. It was almost involuntary; I suppose something in me knew I couldn't save us both, and so I made the split-second decision to save myself. And then I suppose the train went right over him. I didn’t see it, but I definitely heard it.”_

There was another pause, and then the recorded voice sounded wet and sniffly, like the speaker was crying. _“After it happened, I just lay there curled up in a ball, howling like some wounded animal. I couldn’t bring myself to even check what state he was in. I remember feeling that I didn't care anymore whether I lived or died — I just couldn’t care. How could I care? If I’d had the strength to move again, I probably would’ve lain down across those tracks myself._ _Eventually someone from emergency services came to collect me, and I was taken to hospital, though apart from a few scrapes and bruises where I'd landed hard on the ground, I was not injured. I was too afraid to ask what had happened to Kris, even though, of course, I already knew. Later, the worst was confirmed._

_“My memories of the time immediately after the accident have become somewhat vague. All I really remember is how I felt: a constant oscillation between grief and anger, between anger and regret, regret and guilt. I still feel that way now. Often I feel all of those things at once. I find I am increasingly unable to sleep for days at a time because of the recurring nightmares, and I’m worried that it’s affecting my relationship with my current partner. I am still so traumatised by what happened that night, and I just want to be better… to sleep again. I really hope you can help me.”_

 

Chanyeol jammed his finger against the stop button, missing the first time so that he had to do it again. He rolled the window down a bit, stuck his face against the crack and began to suck in fast little gulps of fresh air. When he felt a bit better, he closed the window again and collapsed against the driver’s seat, closing his eyes. He nearly had a heart attack a minute later when he heard a knocking on the window right next to his head, and he saw Baekhyun’s face through the glass, gesturing at him to roll it down.

“Sunny, what are you doing out here?” Baekhyun frowned at the sight of him. “I woke up and couldn’t find you anywhere… I was really worried.”

Chanyeol blinked at Baekhyun as though in a daze. “I came outside to get some air,” he said.

“Inside your car?” Raising an eyebrow at this response, Baekhyun craned his neck to see past Chanyeol. The hedgehog notebook was still beside him on the passenger seat. "What’s that you’ve got there..?”

“That? It’s… it's nothing.” It was a pathetic answer, but Chanyeol was so utterly caught out that he knew it didn’t really matter what he said.

“Sunny, what’s going on?” Baekhyun asked in a quiet voice. “You’re acting really weird.”

“Am I? Or are _you_?” Chanyeol snapped. He covered his face with his hands, regretting it immediately. “I’m sorry. I didn't mean that.”

“What do you mean? How am _I_ acting weird? _You’re_ the one who’s sneaking out in the middle of the night. Were you planning on going somewhere..?”

With a sigh of impatience, Chanyeol ejected the tape from the deck and held it out in front of Baekhyun’s nose. “Why don’t you tell me what _this_ is, then, if you think I’m acting so bloody weird.”

Baekhyun’s eyes widened, though only for a moment. “Where did you get that?” he asked in a quiet voice.

“Never mind where I got it… we both know where I got it. What I want to know is, what the hell _is_ it, and why do you have it?” Chanyeol could feel himself getting slightly hysterical now. He didn’t feel in control of himself anymore. “I mean… is it some kind of joke? Are you trying to fuck with me — is that what you’re trying to do?”

Baekhyun opened his mouth to say something, but only a strange noise came out. “No, of course not,” he said, and then he let out a little sigh. “I can explain… though you probably won’t believe a word of it if I do.”

“Yeah? Try me." Chanyeol didn't know why he had the sudden urge to be hurtful, but the anger rose up in the back of his throat, harsh and acrid, before he had a chance to swallow it back down. “I’ll decide whether I believe it or not, if that’s alright with you.”

Baekhyun nodded. A tear rolled down over his cheek, and he quickly wiped it away. "I've known you for... a while,” he said at last, “longer than you think. In fact, longer than you can remember. Though I know that probably doesn’t make any sense…”

“You’re right, it makes absolutely no sense.” Chanyeol looked at the tape in his hands. Suddenly it felt so insubstantial, like it did not have enough weight to be a real object. He began to feel freaked out by it, and dropped it into the footwell near his feet. “I’ve already listened to the whole recording, anyway, so I know what’s on it. I know the whole story.” He leaned forward, burying his head in his hands. “It can’t be real… it can’t.” He pulled on his hair so hard it hurt, to see if it would wake him up, but the moment of awakening never came. He was still there, in the driver’s seat of his car, out in the street in front of his apartment building, with Baekhyun standing at the window next to him. Baekhyun remained unsettlingly quiet, like he wasn’t daring even to breathe, but Chanyeol could still sense him standing there.

“Did I… did I have part of my memory erased?” he asked, finally lifting his head to look at Baekhyun. “Have you known about this the whole time..?”

He was taken aback by how desperate and miserable Baekhyun looked, like the whole world had crumbled down around him. “Yeah,” he whispered, “I knew.”

Chanyeol sighed and nodded, staring straight ahead through the windscreen for a moment. He reached over to turn the key in the ignition. “Great. Well, that’s that, then.”

“Where are you going..?” Baekhyun said this in a tiny voice that Chanyeol had never heard from him before. He was naturally so gregarious that his presence could easily fill an entire room, but now everything about him seemed smaller somehow. He was shrinking away again, disappearing in front of Chanyeol’s eyes.

“I’m going for a drive,” Chanyeol muttered. “Sorry, but I really need to get out of here for a while.”

“Sunny, please. I’ll tell you everything, I swear… but I need you to come back upstairs with me.” Baekhyun’s eyes were pleading with him, and Chanyeol had to look away, because he knew he was seconds away from caving in. “Let’s go back to bed and talk, okay?”

“Move away from the car,” Chanyeol said quietly. His voice was so icy and sounded so unlike himself that it made him want to cringe. He glanced at Baekhyun one last time through the open window, and then he pulled away from the side of the road. He heard Baekhyun yell _“Chanyeol!”_ after him as he drove away. The sound of Baekhyun calling him by his real name — and the despair in his voice — made his chest feel like it was constricting, but he couldn’t bring himself to turn back. He didn’t know where he was planning to go; he just knew that he had to go somewhere — somewhere else. He couldn’t go back to the apartment. A few streets away, he pulled over, parked the car and rested his head against the steering wheel with his chest heaving, trying to calm himself down. He wanted desperately to cry, but he didn’t. When he glanced at his reflection in the rearview mirror, the eyes that stared back at him did not look like his eyes. He still felt like he couldn’t breathe, and winding the window down all the way didn’t help. All the air in the world would not have helped. 

 

A little later, he was out the front of the train station at Fairy Meadow. He ran up the stairs of the footbridge, taking them two at a time. When he got to the top he looked down at the tracks below, but as he leaned over the railing the feeling of vertigo was so strong that he had to step away from it again. He felt like he might throw up, and wouldn’t that be fitting — to lean over and puke onto the tracks, just like _he_ had done. To fall right over the railing, just like he had done. To meet the very same end, just like he had done, slashed in two by an 8-car Tangara and then left to bleed out on the ballast beneath. Did they remove all the bloodied stones afterwards, he wondered, or had they just left them there? If he went down there now, would he be able to find them? He thought about the time he had found a headless brushtail possum, probably mauled by a dog, while walking home from school years ago; even after a council worker had finally removed the carcass, he’d kept looking out for the bloodstain on the footpath every time he walked past that spot. It had become something of an obsession, and his eyes would always find it somehow, whether he tried to avert them or not. Over time the stain had faded, but never completely. It was probably still there.

_“Everything is falling, dear… all rhyme and reason gone,”_ he sang under his breath. Singing made him feel slightly more at ease, took his mind off the nausea. _“It’s just history repeating itself.”_

Now that he knew what had happened that night, he began to feel like coming here again was a mistake. He still had no memory of the incident, but now he had the mental image, which in some ways was as bad as the real thing — maybe worse, because his imagination would fill in the blanks. This was where he had fallen. Somewhere around here was where it had happened, but he just couldn’t remember. _Why_ couldn’t he remember? The touch of his hand, his voice, what it felt like to kiss him — he remembered nothing of these; but when Baekhyun kissed him, it felt like they were the only lips he had ever kissed in his entire life. In a way he resented Baekhyun for that: for taking the last tatters of Kris’s already frayed memory and stomping them into the dirt. There had already been very little left of him, and now there was nothing at all. There was only _him_ — only Baekhyun. He had completely taken over.

 

Chanyeol sank down to the ground, hunching over with his back against the hard iron railing. He felt like maybe a panic attack was coming. _‘Smoking is prohibited on all platforms of this station’_ , the robot lady announced from one of the speakers down below. She was talking to no one, because no one was there. It was so deserted that Chanyeol began to wonder if he was there, either.

“Are you alright there?” said a voice, and he looked up, startled, to see an older man hovering above him — probably the maintenance guy, Chanyeol guessed, because he had a red plastic bucket filled with cleaning products. He had kindly blue eyes, flecked with concern. 

“Huh..?” Chanyeol replied dumbly.

“It’s nearly one o’clock.” The man glanced at a black plastic sports watch strapped to his wrist. “You’ve missed your chance, I’m afraid… the trains won’t start up again for over four hours.”

Chanyeol blinked up at him, bewildered. “I know,” he said eventually, “I’m not planning on going anywhere. I just came here to think.”

It was a strange thing to say, but it was all he could come up with. The man gave him a funny look, something like a cross between pity and suspicion, but then he shrugged and turned to walk away. He probably thought Chanyeol was out of his mind on something, and in a way he was right. “I see,” he said. “Well, get home safe.”

Chanyeol buried his head in his hands, listening to the man’s fading footsteps until there was nothing but silence again. A dull ache began to throb behind his temples. He felt like a stranger to his own mind, as though he were intruding on someone else’s thoughts. Somewhere along the way, all these things had sunk irretrievably into the swampy murk of his subconscious; but though he could not recall them, he could still feel them there, their ghosts swimming around somewhere near his ankles, lurking. He would just have to dive down deep enough to pull them out.

 

 

* * * * *

 

 

It eventually occurred to Chanyeol that he couldn’t just sit there at the station for the whole night, and so he went back to his car and began to drive aimlessly, heading for nowhere in particular. Though he hadn’t really planned to, he ended up in the street where Minseok and Sehun lived, and parked the car across the road from their apartment building. He sat there for a long time, waiting for something to come to him — some sort of idea, a plan of action. Nothing came. His phone rang repeatedly, but he ignored it. 

When he got irritated by the constant ringing and reached over to silence the damn thing, he felt a twinge of guilt at seeing all the missed calls. By now there were fifteen of them, all from Baekhyun. But he would just have to wait, because Chanyeol wasn’t ready to speak to him yet; anyway, there was someone else he needed to talk to.

Minseok sounded croaky when he answered the phone. Clearly he'd been asleep; it was now early morning, after all. “Yeol? Is something wrong..?”

“I know it’s really late, but I’m parked across the road,” Chanyeol said. “I just… I desperately need to talk to someone right now. Can you come down for a bit?”

He heard what he thought was probably a yawn, or a groan. There was a pause, and then another throaty whisper. “Yeah, of course. Be down in a sec.”

Minseok showed up outside the car a couple of minutes later, wearing pyjama shorts and a white singlet beneath a loosely tied blue dressing gown. He pulled the door open and peered in at Chanyeol with narrowed eyes. “What’s up?” he asked, still sounding slightly groggy from sleep, but Chanyeol could tell from the look on his face that he was concerned. “Did something happen? Are you in trouble?”

Chanyeol leaned over to shove the hedgehog notebook in the glovebox, and then he patted the empty seat beside him. “Sit down,” he said.

Minseok looked down at the seat, and then at Chanyeol. He sat down, pulling the passenger door shut behind him. “What’s going on?”

“Listen to this,” Chanyeol said quietly, and pressed the play button on the tape deck. He studied Minseok’s face as they listened to the recorded conversation, watching him closely for a reaction. But apart from a slight lift of his brow when he first heard Chanyeol’s recorded voice, his expression remained unreadable. When the conversation was over, Chanyeol stopped the tape.

“Where did you get that?” Minseok asked. He was staring through the windscreen out at the street in front of them, but he wouldn’t meet Chanyeol’s gaze.

“Baekhyun had it,” Chanyeol said quietly. “I still haven’t worked out why.”

Minseok shifted a little in his seat. He cleared his throat, looking uncomfortable, but he said nothing.

“Were you aware this whole time that I’d had part of my memory erased?” Chanyeol asked. His voice splintered as he spoke, and he swallowed, which didn’t help much at all. “Please, I need you to tell me the truth.”

Minseok sighed and scratched the back of his neck. Chanyeol knew him well enough to know that he only fidgeted like this when he was nervous. ”Yeah, I knew. We both knew. Sehun and I, that is.”

“So you knew what really happened that night with Kris, then.”

Minseok nodded. 

“You knew about the train.”

“Yeah… but I definitely wasn’t there when it happened. You were the only one with him at the time.”

“You heard what I said just then… when the train came, I jumped out of the way. I left him there to die.” Chanyeol paused to wipe his wet eyes with the back of his hand. “You let me believe that it wasn’t my fault. Well, it kinda sounds like it was.”

“I’m really sorry, Chanyeol.” Minseok’s voice was quiet, almost a whisper. “I don’t really know what to say to you.”

“I just want to know why you kept the truth from me. Did you think I wouldn’t be able to handle it..?”

“No… I just didn't know what telling you the truth would achieve.” Now Chanyeol could hear the weariness in Minseok’s tone. “I mean, what was I supposed to do? What would _you_ have done, if you were in my position?”

"Don't turn this back around on me,” Chanyeol said coldly. “Just answer the question.”

Minseok sighed, leaning back against the headrest. “I honestly thought it would be better for you if you didn't know… and I didn’t come to that decision on my own. I spoke to your mum and dad about it, and they agreed with me because of how much trauma his death had left you with. How could I go against their wishes? I didn't want to keep any of this from you… none of us did."

Chanyeol stiffened when he heard this. “Hang on,” he said. “How many people knew?”

There was another quiet sigh, but this time Minseok remained silent. Chanyeol, however, was persistent.

"How many of you knew about this? Were you all in on it together..?"

“Have you talked to Baekhyun yet?” Now Minseok’s voice was calm and measured again.

“I don’t want to talk to Baekhyun right now. Don’t change the subject.”

Minseok eyed the flashing screen of Chanyeol’s phone. “Well, it looks like he wants to talk to you.”

With a growl of irritation, Chanyeol grabbed the phone and rejected the incoming call. He tossed it over to the back seat behind him, then gave Minseok a look that dared him to argue.

"Look,” Minseok said, “I don't know what state your relationship is in right now, but I really think you should talk to him.”

"This whole time, I believed that Kris died because he fell from that bridge,” Chanyeol muttered, mainly to himself. “That it was an ‘accident’…”

“It _was_ an accident. And he _did_ fall — that wasn’t a lie. I just didn't think you’d even want to remember the full story. Do you know how fucked up you were afterwards?” Minseok sighed and turned to look out the window. “No you don't, do you… because you remember nothing. You don’t remember Kris; you don't remember Baekhyun. You don't remember being so sick and depressed that you almost ended up dead. You don’t remember a single bloody thing. And for that you should consider yourself lucky, because _I_ remember. _We_ are the ones who remember — your family and friends. And we agreed that we would do our best to spare you from the truth of what happened, because we thought it would be the best thing to do. I'm sorry if you disagree.”

“What do you mean, I don't remember Baekhyun..?” Chanyeol asked, looking at him through narrowed eyes. 

With another loud exhale, Minseok replied, "just go talk to him, okay? I’ve already said too much. I’m not the right person to be telling you this stuff."

Chanyeol thought about the hedgehog notebook in the glovebox, and all those drawings of Baekhyun, the little love letters. “Did I know him before?” he said quietly. “Did you?”

For a moment there was only silence, punctured by the sound of a car exhaust backfiring somewhere in the distance. Finally Minseok said, in a defeated tone, “you knew him, alright… you guys were a couple before. Before now, I mean. You just… stopped remembering him.”

Chanyeol stared at Minseok, silenced by his own incredulity. “Honestly, what the fuck are you even on about?”

Minseok shrugged. “Exactly what I just said: you two used to be together. Sehun and I already knew Baekhyun — in fact, we’ve known him for years. But we knew he really wanted to try getting back together with you, and so we just pretended not to know him.”

"Why are you screwing with my head? You of all people." Chanyeol let out a shaky breath, trying to keep his voice steady, even if it was a miserable failure. "I'm screwed up enough as it is.”

"I'm not screwing with your head. It's the truth."

“How? When? Was this before or after Kris?”

Minseok sighed. “Chanyeol, look… about you and Kris—”

“What? _What_ about him?” Now Chanyeol felt like he really was losing it. “What _else_ do I not know?”

The silence that followed was so thick that it seemed to hang in the air for a moment, heavy. “You weren’t his boyfriend,” Minseok said, when he finally spoke. His tone was one of placation, like he was trying not to make Chanyeol angrier. It wasn’t working. “You never were. You were just friends. You were very close to him, yeah, but you never went out. That just… never happened. Or if it _did_ happen, then I certainly never knew about it.”

Chanyeol’s brow furrowed. He opened his mouth to say something, but only a pathetic gurgle came out.

“Haven’t you ever wondered why you have no actual memories of the two of you being together… why there are no photos of you two looking all loved-up and shit? Why you can’t remember having those kinds of feelings for him? The two of you were best friends, not lovers. You may have loved him, I can’t tell you that you didn’t… I don’t know how you really felt about him at the time. I think you may even have had a crush on him for a while, and who could’ve blamed you? He was hot, and really cool, and one of the nicest guys you could ever meet. But I’m fairly certain that he wasn’t your boyfriend… that was just something you made up, a false conclusion your damaged brain conjured on its own after you had that stupid procedure done. And whenever we tried to gently correct you, you got really upset about it. So we just… went along with it after a while.”

“I _did_ have feelings for him.” Chanyeol shook his head. “I did… I’m sure I did.”

“Are you _really_ sure, though? Or do you just think you're sure?” Minseok replied, leaning toward Chanyeol over the centre console. His eyes had a strange gleam to them that Chanyeol didn't like. “Because the mind can be easily swayed, sometimes, when it wants to be.”

Chanyeol turned away from him and covered his face with both hands. He could feel them starting to shake. “Stop it… stop making shit up. I don’t need any of this psychological bullshit from you right now.”

“I’m not making shit up… I just don’t think it’s good to keep doing this to you,” Minseok said. “I think it’s gone on for far longer than it should’ve. We’ve been protecting you for long enough.”

“I suppose you’re going to tell me he didn’t exist next,” Chanyeol muttered. “That he was just some product of my imagination…”

“Who, Kris?” Minseok let out a little scoffing sound. “Of course he existed, Yeol... you know he did. Don’t be dumb.”

“Well, it’s just like you said — why can’t I remember him, then?” Chanyeol was so furious now that he could hardly speak. “If we were never together, then why did you all act like we were? Why did no one ever tell me the truth? Didn’t I deserve the truth? Did you really think lying to me was a better way to handle it?” Now his eyes were leaking tears, and he wiped them away angrily with the heel of his palm. “How am I supposed to believe anything you tell me from now on, when you’ve been lying to me all this time?”

“I guess that’s for you to decide,” Minseok said in a calm voice. The fact that he was able to remain so calm only made Chanyeol angrier. “But now that it’s all out in the open, what reason would I have to keep lying to you?"

Chanyeol tried to think of one, but admittedly he couldn't.

“I’m sorry I kept this from you, Yeol. But it wasn’t just your parents’ wishes I had to respect, you know,” Minseok said. “Baekhyun swore me to secrecy too. He practically begged me, in fact, and how could I refuse him? He’s already been through enough.”

Chanyeol wanted to laugh at that. “What, and I haven’t..?”

There was another stretch of uncomfortable silence. "Chanyeol, I'm sorry,” Minseok said quietly. “I really am.” 

“I’m sorry, too. For calling you out here.” Chanyeol waved his hand in the direction of the passenger door. It was a plainly dismissive gesture, and probably a rude one, but he didn’t care. “You can go now. I have nothing left to say to you.”

Looking defeated once more, Minseok nodded in hopeless silence and got out of the car. Chanyeol watched him walk across the road to his building — hurrying, as though he couldn’t wait to get away — before disappearing inside. He could hear his phone ringing in the back seat again, but he ignored it. He waited for a moment, collecting himself and his thoughts before he drove away.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playlist for Chapter 8:
> 
> 1\. [Babe, You Turn Me On - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FELmPFG4Zlw)  
> 2\. [Elevator - Jonghyun](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQxVBwC4GcY)  
> 3\. [Totally True - Violens](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9XG1IsArGY)  
> 4\. [Wrapped In Blue - The Coral](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTHGAyVSLrc)  
> 5\. [Wasting Time - Bernard Fanning](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VndwNThqolw)


	9. Into The Dark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Please note that this chapter contains a brief mention of attempted suicide

 

______________________________

 

 _[Undated]_  

_Lying in bed with you, holding you close and kissing you until you fall asleep feels like heaven — feels like forever. Often when I’m kissing you I can’t tell if a minute or a lifetime has passed, and I haven’t dated this entry because I want to get that timelessness across. Ha! See what I did there?_

_And I have no other way to tell you that I love being with you when you’re like this — that I wish you would let me see you this way when you’re awake, too, and not just while you’re drifting off. Not because I want to have any kind of power over you in this place of vulnerability, but because I want to take care of you, to see your walls come down. Not a forced collapse, or even a crumbling… but gently lowered because you want me to come in; because you need my love and my understanding, just like I need yours._

 

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Chanyeol kept driving, heading back the way he came. Familiar landmarks all of a sudden seemed foreign; their looming shapes intimidating, the fluorescent lighting lurid in the dark of night. He passed the McDonald’s at Cholesterol Corner where he and Baekhyun sometimes went for their late-night Maccas runs, and felt nothing, looking at it as though he’d never seen it before. Was this really the city he had lived in all his life? It took him longer than it should have to register the wailing siren of an ambulance approaching from behind him, and he quickly moved over into the left lane to let it pass. Sometimes when he was stuck in traffic, he would see one driving on the wrong side of the road to get past the jam, and would wonder how ambulance drivers managed to drive like that and still avoid collisions. Human life was such a precious thing that other people would throw themselves into the path of danger in order to preserve it — at least, some people would. Others, he thought bitterly, just dived out of the way.

There weren’t many cars on the road at that time — probably a good thing, he thought, since he was far too distracted to really focus on driving. Somehow he ended up at Flagstaff Hill, and only realised as the lighthouse came into view that he barely remembered having driven there at all. Clearly it was a danger to have so much on his mind. He pulled into the car park and sat there for a while with his head resting against the steering wheel. He would not go home, he decided. He would sleep (or _not_ sleep, as was more likely) in his car. The car park was unsettlingly deserted, save for a panel van parked all the way at the other end, which Chanyeol had purposely stayed away from. Even from a distance, he thought he could see moving silhouettes through the windows, and it was entirely likely that the people inside it were having sex, or doing drugs, or killing each other, or engaging in some other illicit activity that he was probably better off not knowing about.

Chanyeol looked up at the lighthouse, squinting at the flash of the rotating lantern, and thought about the time Baekhyun had first kissed him at Point Perpendicular. Had it even been the first time they’d done that? Baekhyun had mentioned taking someone he loved there in the past, but maybe it was presumptuous to think that person was him. He couldn’t remember ever going there before. Surely some part of that magnificent, lonely view — the sandstone cliffs dropping sharply into a forever’s worth of ocean — would have tickled some part of his memory, but it hadn’t. He had never seen that place before in his life, or not in any life that he knew.

 

He saw that Baekhyun was calling him again, and this time he picked it up without really thinking, almost too dazed to even mutter a greeting.

“Chanyeol, where the hell are you?” Baekhyun sounded distraught. “Do you have any idea how worried I’ve been..?”

Chanyeol tried to speak, but the words only treacled together, sticking to the roof of his mouth. He couldn’t get anything out. The concern in Baekhyun’s voice made him feel so guilty despite his anger and confusion that he began to cry; loud, embarrassing, hiccupy sobs that shook his entire body. He tried to stifle the noise with his hands, but it was useless.

"Sunny… are you okay? Why are you crying?” Now Baekhyun's voice was full of tenderness and concern, which only made Chanyeol feel worse. He wiped his tears away with the back of his hand, smearing them across his cheeks; he was supposed to be the elder one in the relationship, but he felt like a helpless child, and he hated it.

He sniffled, ordering himself to stop crying. Crying was not going to help anything. "No, I'm not okay,” he said, as soon as he was able to speak again. “Sorry, but I really need to be alone right now.”

“You know I can’t leave you like that,” Baekhyun said. “Why won’t you tell me what’s wrong?"

"I'm just... really fucking confused." Chanyeol looked up at the blurred, ghostly figure of the Wollongong Head lighthouse ahead of him, blinking the tears away until his vision cleared. "I hardly even remember driving here."

"Driving _where?_ Where are you?" Baekhyun asked again, but Chanyeol didn’t answer him.

 "It’s all my fault, you know.” Saying it aloud made it more real — far too real — and he inhaled so sharply that his chest began to hurt. He could feel himself beginning to hyperventilate, and calming down long enough to speak was incredibly difficult. "How can I ever forgive myself for that? Even if I don’t _remember_ doing it, I still did it. I’m still the same person.”

“Are you talking about Kris?” Baekhyun asked quietly, “because that’s not true. I promise you that’s not what happened. It wasn’t your fault at all.”

"How would you know? You weren't there,” Chanyeol snapped, and then regretted it when Baekhyun fell silent. “I heard everything that was said on that tape. We were at the station, he fell from the bridge onto the tracks, and I couldn’t move him away in time. So I just left him there to die while I jumped out of the way. How can you tell me it wasn’t my fault? It was _completely_ my fucking fault.” 

“Well, would it have been better if _both_ of you died?” Chanyeol could hear the sigh of exasperation through the phone, but otherwise Baekhyun’s voice remained patient. “Please, Sunny. I’ll tell you everything — whatever you want to know, I swear. But first I need you to come home."

Chanyeol tried to breathe through his mouth so he wouldn't be heard sniffling through the phone. “I don't think I can come home,” he said. “Not right now.” 

“Tell me where you are, then, and I'll come to you instead.”

Chanyeol took a deep, shaky breath and let it out slowly. “I’m parked near the lighthouse.”

“Which lighthouse? The one at Flagstaff Hill? Please don’t tell me you went all the way to Kiama at this hour...”

When Chanyeol attempted to speak again, nothing came out apart from another choked sob. He felt pathetic, but he couldn’t help it. “I don’t know what to do anymore, Baek… this is so fucked up.”

"Oh, Sunny... I'm coming, okay? I’ll find you. Just promise me you’ll stay right where you are, and I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

 

As soon as Baekhyun ended the call, Chanyeol folded his arms on the steering wheel and buried his face against them. He had mostly stopped crying, and now he just felt sick. It occurred to him then that he hadn’t even told Baekhyun which lighthouse he was parked in front of, but he knew that Baekhyun would end up finding him somehow. He seemed to know Wollongong — and Chanyeol himself, for that matter — a lot better than Chanyeol did.

The more Chanyeol thought about this, the more infuriating he found it; they were both territories that he had inhabited for far longer, and should have known better: the hazardous terrain of his mind, and his hometown. But instead, Baekhyun was usually the one to come up with new and interesting suggestions for dates: places they could visit either within the city itself or its surrounding areas. He liked to go exploring, and in the past few months alone they had been to Kiama, the old military barracks at Port Kembla, Lake Illawarra, Minnamurra Falls, and Wedding Cake Rock. Chanyeol remembered the time Baekhyun had dragged him inside the creepy old train tunnels at Helensburgh, which had long been taken over by colonies of glow-worms. It had taken a lot of coaxing to get him in there that day, but when he finally did venture inside that dark archway (clutching Baekhyun’s hand for dear life the whole time) he had to admit that it was incredible to see -- all those tiny moving lights, each with a life of its own. Even more stunning was the memory of Baekhyun standing there, gazing up at the ceiling of the tunnel with that eerie blue glow illuminating his face and hair — so beautiful and electric, his eyes shining with wonder.

What would he do if these memories were ever taken from him — who would he be then? And how would he ever be able to move on now, knowing there could be many more precious moments like these, all of them lost forever? It was already easy enough for a small-city boy to feel like his hometown was his whole world, but being with Baekhyun made Chanyeol feel like it really was. There was so much more colour in his life now, all because of this one person; but now he could see that it had all been a fabrication, and the beautiful world Baekhyun had built for the two of them would soon fall into ruins. Everything seemed so unbalanced, so precarious; who or what could he believe in if he couldn’t believe in Baekhyun, or even himself?

He couldn’t stand to be alone with his thoughts anymore, so he turned the radio on. As soon as he realised Flame Trees was playing, he switched over to a different station. The phone rang again, and when he saw that it was Minseok calling this time, he picked it up and grunted “what?” into it.

“Are you okay? I really need to talk to you,” Minseok said. “There’s no way I’m gonna be able to sleep again unless I do." 

“I’m not ready to talk to you yet,” Chanyeol said coldly.

“Yeol, I know you don’t want to hear it… but we were only trying to protect you.”

“Yeah, well, a big fucking lie to protect me is still a big fucking lie.”

“I know,” Minseok said, “I _know_ that. I’m not saying it’s a valid excuse to lie to you... it’s just a reason. I had two options: lie to you and hurt you, or tell you the truth and hurt you. Either way, I’ve hurt you, and I’m so sorry about that. But it wasn’t my decision to make alone, and I didn’t know what else I could do.”

Chanyeol didn’t want to hear Minseok out, but he wasn’t exactly hanging up, either. “Alright, fine,” he said. “I get it... your hands were tied. But that doesn’t mean I’m ready to forgive you.”

“That’s cool, I don’t expect you to forgive me right away. I just wanted you to know why I did it.”

Chanyeol sighed. “Well, it looks like you weren’t the only one in on it, so… I guess I can’t be mad at you alone.”

“Look, I know we shouldn’t have gone along with the whole ‘Kris was your boyfriend’ thing,” Minseok said, “but you don’t know how bad it was. In that first couple of weeks after you had the erasure done, you were just walking around in a cloud of confusion — like some kind of mind-altered state. You no longer remembered Baekhyun at all. You thought Kris was the one you loved, and that you had lost him, and you got upset whenever we tried to set you straight — as if we were trying to take him away from you. You really seemed to believe that _he_ was the one you’d been with, when he wasn’t. After the damage they inflicted on you, those incompetent fuckers at the clinic reassured us that what you were going through wasn’t necessarily permanent… that the memories that were stolen from you could repair themselves over time. This wasn’t a new situation, they said; it was something that had happened before. But now it’s been a few years, and you’re still… well...”

“Still what?” Chanyeol asked. “Still defective?”

He heard Minseok sigh through the phone. “No,” he said, “I didn’t mean that. Just... not like you used to be.”

“So you’re saying I’m not ‘all there’, in other words.”

“No, that’s not what I’m saying. I don’t think it affected… well, your mental capacity. But you’ve lost memories of certain experiences, certain people — important ones, too. Those are all things that ultimately shape who you are, right? So losing them must surely have had some sort of effect on the person you were, and on who you are now. Without them, how can you possibly be the same as you were before? You just can’t.” 

Chanyeol turned his head to look out the window. The moon seemed intent on hiding that night, leaving only a faint glow peeping out from behind the clouds. “Sometimes I wonder if I’m more or less myself these days... if I’ll ever be my ‘real’ self again,” he said quietly. “Or is the person I am now my real self? Does it even matter either way? Why can’t I just be more than the things that have happened to me..?”

“You can. You _are_.” Minseok’s voice was gentler now. “You’re still you, you know… essentially. You’re still Chanyeol. You may be a slightly different Chanyeol than you were before, but it doesn’t mean we think differently of you, or that we love you any less.” He paused, and Chanyeol could almost hear him thinking in the silence that followed. “Things are just... new. You learned to adjust, and so did we. I’m really sorry that period of adjustment involved being dishonest with you… but it was such a crazy, fucked-up situation, and there was no guidebook to get us through it. We could only try to do what we thought was best for you at the time, Baekhyun included.”

“Then why did he leave?” Chanyeol asked. This was the real burning question on his mind. “If he really loved me, why would he just give up on me like that? Even if I couldn’t remember him… I could’ve learned to love him again.”

“Well, I’m sure you could’ve. But don’t you reckon that’s a hell of a lot to ask of someone?”

Chanyeol sighed. “Yeah... maybe you’re right.”

“You didn’t love him anymore, Yeol,” Minseok pointed out, “so what was he supposed to do? You believed that you loved someone else, someone who was dead. Maybe he just didn’t know how to cope with that. I’m not surprised that he felt like he had to leave. And knowing him, he probably did it for your sake as much as his.”

“But if I loved him before, then _why_ can’t I remember him?” With a frustrated groan, Chanyeol leaned forward until he hit the steering wheel with his forehead. “I just don’t get it… why would I have erased him? I didn’t _ask_ to erase him… at least, it wasn’t on the tape.” He sat there like that for a moment in silence, and his forehead began to hurt a bit, but he hardly noticed it. “But he must have been such a big part of me, because I have no other way to explain the emptiness I felt in that time before we met. Such a heavy, oppressive emptiness... like it really weighed on me. It was like I knew something else was missing — something vital. And then I met him, and suddenly it all felt right again. I mean, I still couldn’t sleep at night… but I would look at him lying next to me and I would feel so much lighter anyway, simply because I knew that he loved me.”

Minseok was quiet for a while. “Sometimes I think that a part of you did always remember him,” he said, “and that maybe you just haven’t realised it yet.” 

“What do you mean..?”

“He still calls you Sunny, right? Or was it Sunflower... I don’t remember.”

“Well, yeah,” Chanyeol said, “he calls me both. Because of the tat, I think.”

“Ah, but you didn’t always have that tattoo,” Minseok said. “Why’d you even get it in the first place?”

Chanyeol had no idea what he was getting at. “I dunno… maybe because I wanted to?”

Minseok exhaled impatiently, as though Chanyeol wasn’t getting it — which he wasn’t, he couldn’t have been more lost. “Just think about it, okay? Think about which one of those things might’ve come first.”

Chanyeol looked down at his chest, where the sunflower petals peeked out from the neckline of his shirt. When he opened his mouth to respond, he heard the familiar sputtering sound of an engine, and looked up to see Baekhyun pulling up alongside the car. “Baek’s here,” he said quickly, “I gotta go.”

“Alright, mate. Good luck with everything.” There was a beeping sound as Minseok ended the call, and Chanyeol only had a couple of seconds to collect his thoughts before the car door was suddenly yanked open.

“Hey,” Baekhyun said, sounding breathless. He peered in at Chanyeol through the open door. “Are you alright..?” 

"Yeah. Well… not really.” Chanyeol forced a smile anyway. “How’d you know I was here?”

Baekhyun rolled his eyes. “Don’t you think I know you by now?” He managed a smile in return, but then he looked sombre again. “Can I sit down?"

Chanyeol rubbed his eyes and nodded, patting the seat next to him. So Baekhyun knew where he was after all; he was right to feel like this place held some sort of great significance for them both. He couldn't help feeling mortified that he’d cried like a baby on the phone earlier, but to his relief, Baekhyun didn't mention it; he plopped down on the passenger seat next to Chanyeol, pulling the door shut behind him. He was quiet for a moment, and then Chanyeol felt a hand on top of his head. Although his first instinct was to flinch, he let Baekhyun stroke his hair; part of him wanted to shrug the hand off, but it was nice to be touched for no reason other than to provide comfort.

"Are you _sure_ you’re okay?" Baekhyun asked softly. His hand travelled down the back of Chanyeol’s neck, kneading him there gently for a moment, and then he moved it away. His voice sounded slightly croaky, and Chanyeol wondered if he had also been crying earlier. He figured Baekhyun was probably just tired, though, because he barely managed to hold in a yawn, stifling it with the palm of his hand.

"I don’t really know what I am," Chanyeol said. He tried to keep the bitterness out of his voice, but it was hard. “I just found out that I’m a complete shit-stain of a human being, so... there’s that, I guess.”

“You’re not a shit-stain,” Baekhyun began, but Chanyeol cut him off.

“Please, Baek… don’t try to make me feel better about this,” he said quietly. “I know what I did. Now I have to live with it.”

Baekhyun didn’t respond, but Chanyeol heard him swallow loudly and shift around in his seat, followed by nothing but dead silence for a minute or two. Eventually he heard the wet sound of Baekhyun’s lips separating, and the little breath he drew as he prepared to say something. He stopped and swallowed again instead. “Are you really mad at me?” he said at last, looking a bit like a scolded child. At any other time, Chanyeol would have thought it was the cutest thing in the world, but now he only found it mildly irritating.

“How do you think I feel right now?” he said. “I have no idea who I am anymore; but _you_ seem to know a hell of a lot, don’t you... and yet you refuse to tell me. All you people do is withhold stuff — stuff that affects me. How am I supposed to feel about that?”

Baekhyun just nodded and fell silent again. How had they become like this in only a day, Chanyeol wondered — so afraid to speak to each other, when only yesterday it felt like they were freely telling each other everything. When only yesterday he'd gazed up at Baekhyun with that halo of morning sunlight crowning his head, and had felt so overwhelmed by love and desire that he couldn't hold it in — couldn't keep the _'I love you's_  spilling from his lips, couldn't keep his hands away from his body, couldn't stop.

Now, though, the two feet of space between them felt like it could swallow them both up. Baekhyun cleared his throat, pausing for a moment to compose himself. When he finally spoke, his voice wavered a little. "So we should probably talk, hey.”  

Chanyeol let out a dry, humourless chuckle. "Yeah, probably."

“Do you hate me?” Baekhyun asked.

“No, Baek,” Chanyeol sighed, “I don’t hate you.”

The flicker of hope Baekhyun got in his eyes when he heard this was mildly heartbreaking. “Then you still love me..?”

“What do you think the answer to that question is?” Chanyeol said patiently.

“I think...” Baekhyun began, and then he paused again, lost in thought. “I think that maybe you _do_ still love me, although possibly a bit less than before. And I wouldn’t blame you for it, either.”

“Of course I still love you. I mean, yeah, I’m pretty fucking angry that you kept all this shit from me... but it’s _because_ I love you that I feel so betrayed right now. Otherwise why should I care?” Chanyeol let his head fall back against the seat and closed his eyes. “Anyway, it’s not like I could stop loving you just like that." 

“Yeah? You’d be surprised,” Baekhyun said quietly. "Mind if I open the window? It’s really stuffy in here.” He reached for the handle to wind the window down, and then he sat there for a moment with both hands in his lap, staring down at them quietly. Chanyeol followed his gaze, but it was hard to look at those hands without picturing vividly all the places they had been on his body, so he looked away again.

Baekhyun started humming along with the radio. “I love this song,” he said. “I only saw Powderfinger once before they broke up.”

“Me too… that time they toured with Silverchair.” Chanyeol didn’t even know how he knew this, since he couldn’t really remember the show itself; he just knew on some level that he had been there. He could _feel_ that he had been there, in the reverberating bassline of that song on the radio.

Baekhyun smiled. “Yes! Were you at the Wollongong show?” When Chanyeol nodded, he said, “that was the one I went to. We must’ve been there at the same time.”

It gave Chanyeol chills; the very thought that they had both been there that night, probably walking right past each other without knowing it. He wondered if Kris had been there with him too; he would have been alive back then. Would Kris have been into the same kinds of music as he was — and if they hadn’t been lovers after all, then were they the kind of best friends who did everything together? How could there be nothing left of him at all?

"So,” Chanyeol said, “what did you want to tell me, then?”

Baekhyun was quiet for a moment before he replied. “If you really knew how much I love you, and for how long... maybe some of the things I’ve done would make sense to you.” He picked up the little green hedgehog notebook from the seat next to him, flicked through it quickly and then held it out towards Chanyeol. “I believe this is yours.”

Chanyeol only glanced at the notebook before he looked away again. “So you did know, then. You knew this whole time.”

Baekhyun made a little humming sound instead of replying, and Chanyeol reached down into the footwell to pick up the tape with his name on it, which he’d dropped down there earlier. He held it in his hands, looking at it closely. “You know, I went to that Lakuna place one day, on the way home from one of my Sunday rounds… it was a little while ago. I don’t really know why, but I just felt the need to go there. And I found an envelope full of tapes just like this one, shoved into the mail slot of the front door,” he said quietly. “I’d been driving up and down that street for God knows how long, trying to work out what kept drawing me back there… why I always felt like something was missing — like I’d misplaced something really important — even though I couldn’t remember what it was. And then I saw you on that day we first met, sitting out the front with your head in your hands, looking like you’d lost something too.”

Baekhyun didn’t respond. He was looking away from Chanyeol, staring at something — or perhaps nothing, since it was dark outside — through the window.

“Was that why you were there that day?” Chanyeol asked quietly. “Were you the one who put those tapes there?”

“Yeah… that was me.” Baekhyun let out a bitter little laugh. “That wasn’t the day we first met, though. But I’m sure you’ve probably figured that out by now.”

Chanyeol opened his mouth to speak, and then paused. He was still holding the tape. “I didn’t mean to go through your stuff, you know... I wasn’t snooping around because I don’t trust you, or anything like that. I was just looking for a condom. And instead I find this tape with my name on it, and a notebook full of stuff in my own handwriting that I can’t remember ever having written. So I suppose you can’t really blame me for being kinda freaked out.”

“I know,” Baekhyun said. One corner of his mouth twitched a little, like maybe a tiny smile was coming. Eventually he did smile, but it was only a weak one. “I wanted to tell you about it, Chanyeol… I really did. But I just couldn’t. I was so scared you’d just write me off for being crazy.” Chanyeol looked at his eyes, at the sadness in them — those same eyes he’d gazed into so many times. While talking to him. While lying in bed, holding him tight. While making love — a time when Baekhyun’s eyes seemed to be their most honest, when everything was laid bare; emotion in its rawest, most vital form. All that time, he couldn’t recall seeing even a speck of dishonesty, and he still couldn’t see any now.

“I don’t want you to hold anything back from me anymore, Baek,” he said. “I just want the truth. And it doesn't matter how bad or painful or even just straight-up fucking unbelievable you think it is… I need to know. As long as it comes from you, I’ll try my hardest to believe it.”

Baekhyun turned his head towards the open window again, staring out at the blackness of the ocean. When he looked at Chanyeol, the sea breeze kept blowing his blue hair over his eyes, and it was hard to hear him speak over its taunting whisper. “If I promise to tell you everything right now, will you hold my hand?”

Chanyeol reached over to grab his hand, holding it tight. “I won’t let go. Not unless you tell me to.”

Baekhyun nodded, taking a deep breath to prepare himself. “You said you wanted me to open up to you more… well, this is me opening up.” He looked down at their joined hands for a long time. “You have no memory of it now, of course, but we used to be together. I don't know how else to say it without sounding like I've lost the fucking plot, but it’s the truth. And I know I can't make you believe what I’m telling you... I can only tell you my side of what happened, my own version of events. How you react to it is up to you."

"When were we together?” Chanyeol asked quietly. “For how long?”

“For almost two years. It ended about a year before we met. That is, for the second time." Baekhyun’s eyes were glistening now, and he wiped them with his free hand and took another deep breath, letting it out slowly. Chanyeol couldn’t tell if he was actually crying, or if his eyes were just watering from the wind.

“Why did it end, then?” he asked.

“It ended because you went to Lakuna one day, and you had me erased me from your memory,” Baekhyun said. “And I had no clue if it was something you’d planned to do because of an argument we’d had earlier that day, or if it was all just a terrible mistake. So I took the tape of your interview from the clinic, and a few others that were recorded at the same time, because I was trying to find out what went wrong. I was working at Lakuna back then, you see — I had a part-time reception job, because the pay was decent and I could work around my uni schedule. It also meant that I had access to all patient records, including yours.” He laughed, but again there was no joy in it. “You know, when I first applied for that job, I thought it was just an ordinary mental health clinic… but the more I learned about what they did there, well, the more unsettled I began to feel about it.”

“I didn’t ask for it, you know,” Chanyeol said quietly. “I never asked to have you erased… it was never mentioned on the tape. It was all about Kris and his death.”

Baekhyun nodded. “I know. I listened to that tape about a hundred times, just to be sure I hadn’t missed anything. I listened to it so much that I began to think I was going nuts; there was a time when I could’ve easily recited that entire conversation by heart. Then I wondered if maybe there was another tape from a separate consultation that I wasn’t aware of, where perhaps you’d asked to have _me_ erased from your memory as well. I looked everywhere just in case such a tape existed, but I never found anything.” He fell silent then, still holding Chanyeol’s hand, absently stroking circles into the back of it with his thumb. “Isn’t it a funny idea that when you memorise something, you supposedly ‘know it by heart’,” he mused. “Is that where memories really go — the heart? And I know we’ve established that parts of the mind can be erased… but can the heart be erased too? Or was I just never really in your heart to begin with?”

Chanyeol didn’t know what to say to that. It was a good while before he felt like he was able to speak again. “Is that how we met the first time — at the clinic?” he asked, but Baekhyun shook his head.

“No,” he said, and paused for a moment, lost in thought. “Do you remember when I told you that story about the day I bought Buzz?”

“Vaguely,” Chanyeol said.

“The guy who was flirting with me and talked me into buying him, right? That was you. That was how we met.” Baekhyun laughed softly, and then he was quiet again for a while. Chanyeol could tell that he was reminiscing from the way his eyes seemed to cloud over. “You were there visiting Minseok that day, and I knew right away that you didn’t actually work there, of course… it was so bloody obvious. You just wanted an excuse to walk up to me and start something, and you know what? I was sold. So I went home that day with a shiny new scooter, and your mobile number scribbled on a fluoro pink post-it. I’m sure you can guess which one of those things I was more excited about.” He sat there with his head tilted to one side, both his eyes closed, smiling to himself again as he remembered. “I think I waited two whole agonising hours before I made the decision to text you first. I remember thinking you were such a babe… the most beautiful man I’d ever seen in my life. And you seemed like a real sweetheart, too. I was head over heels from the word go.”

Chanyeol didn’t reply. He just watched Baekhyun sitting there in his own private reminiscence, waiting for him to continue speaking.

“So we ended up going out. It wasn’t long before we moved in together, and it was great. I was so in love... I’d never been so happy with another person before, and you seemed really happy too. Or you did at first, anyway.” The lighthouse flashed behind them, briefly illuminating Baekhyun’s face and the inside of the car. “What I didn’t know back then was that you suffered from terrible nightmares, so bad that they kept you from sleeping properly. It took a while for you to open up to me about what had happened to Kris, and the trauma that it left you with. You’d never spoken about it openly until then. At night, though, while you were sleeping… that was when it all came out.”

“You know, Minseok told me something about Kris… that he was never my boyfriend, he was my best friend,” Chanyeol said. “The boyfriend detail was just something that my brain made up after the erasure. But because I really believed we’d been together, everyone had to go along with it to avoid upsetting me. Is that true?”

Baekhyun nodded. “Before you had the erasure done, you only ever referred to him as your best friend from high school. You never mentioned anything about the two of you being in a relationship. But regardless of whether he was a friend or something more, I felt so sad for you when you told me. I just couldn’t imagine it... the horror and grief and guilt you must have felt, even though it wasn’t your fault at all.”

“What did I do during the night?” Chanyeol asked. “Did I wake up screaming?”

"No… not exactly. But you tossed around a lot, and whimpered, and mumbled things in your sleep. Sometimes you would cry — real heaving sobs, and it would take a while for you to stop. You weren’t really awake, so I couldn’t snap you out of it, but usually holding you was enough to calm you down. But I think there were probably quite a few nights where you didn’t sleep at all, and you were also really fucking jumpy a lot of the time. On a bad day, just a sudden loud noise was all it took — that would be enough to make you collapse in a quivering heap on the floor. It got bad enough that you were put on anxiety medication, which seemed to help for a while. Looking back on it, it was a very difficult situation to be in. I didn’t mind at the time because I really loved you, and all I wanted was to help you get better. But I was in way over my head.”

Baekhyun let out a shaky breath, using his free hand to wipe his eyes. The other hand was still on top of Chanyeol’s, squeezing it rather hard, almost to the point of being uncomfortable, but Chanyeol didn’t have the heart to move his hand away. “I didn’t realise how bad things really were until I came home from work one day, and found you lying on the floor beside the bed, completely unresponsive. I couldn’t wake you up. Then I found your container of meds on the floor nearby, and saw that it was empty. I immediately called for an ambulance, and they thankfully got you to the hospital in time to sort you out. But my relief didn’t last long; after it happened, all I could think about was that you were going to try it again... that I couldn’t always be there to save you. Maybe next time I would get there too late. And after that, it was my turn to stop sleeping.”

Chanyeol studied Baekhyun closely, taking in every emotion as it flashed across his face. He often felt the urge to just stare at Baekhyun for the pleasure of it: at the way his lips moved when he spoke, and the way he smiled, and the light that danced in his eyes. Looking at him was a genuine joy. If he felt so compelled to stare at Baekhyun all the time, then surely he had spent a lot of time staring at him before, too — absorbing every tiny little detail — and still he had not managed to save him. How could it be possible, he thought, to just completely forget someone like that, especially someone so achingly beautiful?

“When I think back on that day, I sort of doubt that you’d really planned to end your life,” Baekhyun said quietly, when he was able to speak again. “I thought that maybe it was just in that moment, whatever you were feeling had become so unbearable that you were desperate not to feel it anymore. But I couldn’t be sure of that… I had no way of knowing. I just knew that I needed to help you somehow, and that it was urgent -- I hated seeing you in pain and knowing there wasn’t anything I could do about it. But I knew there was one thing I _could_ still try… a last resort. So, although I’d been avoiding it for a long time, I finally told you what it was that they really did at my workplace; how they erased people’s bad memories there, the ones they couldn’t cope with. At first you thought I was nuts, which was understandable… but the more you thought about it, the more you warmed up to the idea, and seemed really enthusiastic about having it done. So I made an appointment for a consultation.”

Chanyeol felt Baekhyun's hand moving on top of his own again, interrupting his thoughts. “So… the whole thing was your idea, then,” he said, his voice barely a whisper.

Baekhyun nodded. “It was… you never would've done it at all if it wasn’t for me. Around the same time, though, I’d begun to hear whispers about things going wrong at the clinic, and I realised I could be making a terrible mistake by letting you have the erasure done. What if the same thing happened to you? By that time, there had already been a few cases of patients having memories wiped that they didn't ask to be removed, while the ones they _did_ want to remove were left intact — either completely or partially. Another patient was left with anterograde amnesia after having the procedure done, which thankfully reversed itself over time. But it made me extremely nervous… and I really wanted to talk you out of it, but I couldn’t. I didn’t have the heart to do it. On the morning of your procedure, though, I finally grew the balls to sit you down and beg you not to go through with it. I don’t even know why I was so adamant… I just had this horrible feeling that it was going to go very wrong. I felt like you would understand where I was coming from, or I hoped you would. You didn’t. You accused me of not being supportive — of actually wanting you to suffer — which wasn’t true at all. So we had a heated argument about it, and then you stormed out of the apartment.”

Baekhyun paused for a moment and swallowed. By this time he had let go of Chanyeol’s hand, and now both his hands were in his lap again. “I mean, what could I do? I had no choice but to just let you go through with it. I remember feeling so off that day, for some reason… it was almost like a premonition. I was in a lecture later that morning and I had a weird anxiety episode, so I had to run out of the hall. I actually felt like I was being ripped away from myself — almost like I was disappearing. It was terrifying. Then I had a shift at the clinic that same afternoon, so I went to see you after you woke up." He closed his eyes for a moment, and a tear rolled down over his cheek, quickly chased by another. "And when you saw me, the first thing you did was look at me, smile politely, and ask me who I was. At first I thought you were joking; that it was just a mean trick you were playing on me. But it quickly became obvious that you weren’t.”

Chanyeol reached over to hold Baekhyun’s hand again, giving it a gentle squeeze. “If this is hard for you to talk about, then you don’t have to,” he said. “We can continue later.”

"No… you deserve to know. I’ve kept this from you for far too long already,” Baekhyun replied. He sniffled a bit, wiping his eyes, and then carried on speaking. “When I expressed my concerns to one of the ‘doctors’, if you could call them that, I was told that it wasn't unusual for patients to experience a temporary fugue after the erasure. Any memories that were unintentionally targeted should gradually return within a few weeks… maybe a few months, worst-case scenario. This gave me a bit of hope, but not much. You still had no idea who I was, so to give you the space to recover, I moved out of our apartment, and Minseok and Sehun kindly offered to let me stay with them in the interim. I don’t know if you remember this, but maybe a few weeks after the erasure, they invited you over while I was staying there, just to see what would happen. Again, you had no clue who I was… you were polite, but I think you were still very muddled at the time, and you seemed unusually withdrawn. No light came on in your eyes when you saw me.” He laughed, albeit somewhat bitterly. “You even asked me how long I’d known the boys for, as if you didn’t know it was because of _you_ that I was even friends with them in the first place. It really was bizarre. I remember thinking I would’ve laughed, if I hadn’t been so upset by it.”

“I don’t remember that at all,” Chanyeol said quietly. “But I feel terrible about it anyway.”

Baekhyun just nodded absently in response. He had a strange look in his eyes that Chanyeol had never seen before; flat, almost lifeless. “Up until then, I was in denial that you might have erased me on purpose... but after that day, I became sure that it must be true,” he said. “It had to be true, but I wanted to be completely certain. So the next time I was at Lakuna, I secretly ‘borrowed’ some of the consultation tapes for people who'd had their memories erased on the same day as you, and I took them home with me. I would borrow several tapes at a time, listen to them, and then put them back so I wouldn’t get caught. I went through them all, trying to see if I could work out what might’ve gone wrong, but I came up with nothing. I never went back to Lakuna after that; not even to return any of the tapes I still had in my possession. It got to the point where I didn't want to set foot in that place ever again. I let myself in the apartment while you were at work one day, and I removed the rest of my stuff — by the time I was done, it was like I'd never existed. When I told Minseok and Sehun I was planning to move back home, they were really sad for me, but I think they understood why I had to do it. I promised I'd keep in touch, but I just needed to be on my own for a while; to remember who I was again, the person I’d been before I met you. Even after I moved back to Nowra, though, I still called Minseok every now and then, just to see how you were doing.”

“I really wish I’d known about all this, Baek,” Chanyeol said. “What did he tell you?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “Just that you were okay… that was usually the gist of it. Whenever I asked if you’d mentioned me, though, he always said no, so after a while I stopped asking. While I was back at home, I tried really hard to move on. I dated a few other people, but I couldn’t truly enjoy being with any of them, either physically or emotionally; they were all nice enough, but there was just no spark there at all. I tried not to compare them to you, but I couldn’t help it. The sex was mediocre at best, but with you it was always fun and sexy and wonderful — not because it was perfect, but because you really cared about loving me, and making me feel good, and I felt the same way about you. I never had that with anyone else. I didn’t even know what it meant to make love to someone until I met you, and realised that what we did together was the very definition it; that the intimacy we shared really meant something for both of us. I even remember taking a guy to Point Perpendicular one day, and I tried kissing him near the lighthouse; but it wasn’t good at all, and I could tell he was confused by the intent behind it. Afterwards, I felt so awful about taking him there. Deep down I knew that it didn’t really matter, because you didn’t remember it anyway… but I felt like a monster for even getting that idea in my head, that such a beautiful, personal memory was replaceable. That it could be relived again with a different person, and have anywhere near the same significance it did when I shared it with you. I felt guilty about that for a long time. And so I made sure we had our first kiss there again this time around, because I felt like it was the only way to make it right. And it did feel right. Kissing you there felt just as special as it did the first time.” He laughed a little. “The _first_ first time, I mean.”

“Why were you so convinced that I had you erased on purpose, if there was no recorded evidence of it?” Chanyeol asked. “What if it really was just a mistake?”

“I had no way to be sure, really,” Baekhyun said. “But I knew how angry you were when I’d tried to talk you out of the erasure, and I couldn’t rule it out. I’d never seen you so angry before. When you accused me of wanting you to suffer, it really hurt me a lot, because of course I didn't want that... I acted the way I did because I was terrified of losing you. And then I lost you anyway.”

"But… I wouldn't do that, Baek. I just wouldn’t.” When Baekhyun didn't look at him, Chanyeol reached out to hold him under the chin, turning his head until they faced each other. "Baekhyun, look at me. I would never do that to you." 

“Yeah? And how do you know that?” Baekhyun lowered his eyes, releasing a few tears that crystallised on his cheeks. They slid down his face and into Chanyeol’s hand, which was still cupping his chin. “How do you know, if you can’t even remember doing it?”

Chanyeol sighed and moved his hand away. “I feel like no matter what I say right now, it’ll only be the wrong thing,” he said quietly. “Maybe I just shouldn’t talk.”

"In a way, it's a huge relief to finally get everything out in the open,” Baekhyun said thoughtfully. “It was much harder than I thought it would be, acting as though I didn't know you before. Pretending I never loved you for as long as I have… or that I wasn’t still hurt because of how it ended. Trying to swallow down my guilt for leaving you, even though I was the one who’d been forgotten.”

In a bid to lighten the atmosphere, Chanyeol picked up the hedgehog notebook and took out some of the loose papers folded inside it. He began flicking through them. “So I really wrote all this stuff, hey.”

Baekhyun nodded. “When I collected the rest of my things from the apartment, I made damn sure I removed all traces of myself,” he said. “I was very thorough — brutal, even. I went through all your journals and tore out all of the drawings, all the diary entries, all the little love letters… if anything made even the vaguest reference to me, I got rid of it. I didn’t want you to find them later and be confused about who I was. I’d always known about the journals, it wasn’t a secret... but you never showed them to me while we were together, and I’d always felt it would be intrusive of me to ask if I could read them. But I really wish you’d shown them to me at the time, because they opened my eyes to a lot of things I never knew before.”

Chanyeol just continued to read in silence. “Seems like I really loved you,” he said quietly.

"You did,” Baekhyun said, and when Chanyeol looked over at him, he managed a shy little smile. “You wrote a lot of beautiful things about me. I couldn't bring myself to read them right after we broke up, but I also couldn’t bear to throw them away… so I kept them all hidden in a drawer at home. When I did eventually have the guts to read them, they quickly became very precious to me. All those little windows into your mind and heart… and fantasies.” He laughed softly. “Some of them were really sexy, sort of like erotic poetry — you definitely made me blush more than a few times with your words. And all the drawings, too. It was very sweet to finally see myself the way you saw me, and I found it incredibly touching; it was so nice to have a part of you all to myself again, because I felt like that stupid procedure had sucked the life out of you. It ripped away the heart that I loved, and took all the love out of your eyes… but all those things you wrote made me feel like I could touch a little part of your soul again, and I never truly understood the depth of your love for me until I read your writing. But do you know how devastating it is to realise how much someone loved you only after that love is gone?”

“If you loved me, and you knew that I loved you... then why did you leave?” Chanyeol asked. "You’re everything I’ve ever wanted in a lover… and lots of things I never even _knew_ I wanted. There’s no way I wouldn’t have fallen for you again.”

Baekhyun was quiet for a moment before he replied. “You have to know that leaving wasn’t a decision I made lightly,” he said, “but it quickly became very clear to me that you were still grieving this relationship with Kris that had never really existed, and I couldn’t just wait around and expect you to snap out of it. Anyway, I wasn’t ready to try again either… I was too hurt and angry. I didn’t know how to _not_ be angry.”

“At me..?”

“At everyone, and everything. I think I was angry at myself, mostly. And there were so many times when I really wished I could just forget about you too, but I couldn’t.”

“You could have had _me_ erased, you know,” Chanyeol said. “If you really wanted to. If it was hurting you that much.”

“I _did_ think about doing that, many times, but I couldn’t go through with it,” Baekhyun said quietly. “I decided I’d rather live with the pain I felt than do that, especially once I realised how risky it was. And I didn’t want to have anything more to do with those people... I was so glad to see that they’d finally been shut down. It should have happened a long time ago.”

“What made you decide to come back here, then?” Chanyeol asked.

“Well, when I felt ready to get out of Nowra again, I came back here and moved in with Kyungsoo. I’d realised that apart from my family, there wasn’t much left for me at home anyway. I’d already deferred from uni by then, but I knew I would have to go back there eventually, or else I would lose my place in the course. I got the job at the bookshop, which was enough to get by until I got my second job at The Palace. When I told Minseok I was back in the Gong, he sounded really happy about it; he said you were doing really well lately, and that, if I wanted to, he would ‘re-introduce’ you to me — ‘just to see if sparks will fly again’, as he put it.” Baekhyun laughed and shook his head. “I should’ve known he’d probably tell you to order food from the Palace, though... I nearly had a heart attack when I saw your details come up on the order list that night.”

Hearing this made Chanyeol groan in dismay. He could picture Minseok in his mind’s eye, doing that annoying, smug little wink of his. “Of course he would do that. The cheeky bastard.”

”I know, right… can I have that book for a second?” Baekhyun took the hedgehog book from Chanyeol and flipped it open, his smile suddenly turning mischievous. “I wanna do a live reading of one of my personal favourites.” 

Chanyeol grimaced at the thought. “Um, okay… if you must.”

Baekhyun began to pore through the pages until he found what he was looking for. “Aha — here it is.” He sat up straight and cleared his throat before reading aloud. “ _‘I’m always thinking about how gorgeous you are, beautiful from head to toe. Your face — so unbelievably perfect that it makes me want to cry sometimes. Your lovely lips, your smiley eyes and your big, beautiful brain. Your sweet little freckles that I love to count with my kisses. Your broad shoulders, and your strong, smooth thighs. Your chiseled abs and sculpted chest. I love your pretty hands, and your adorable bellybutton, and your luscious, peachy bum—’_ ” 

“Ugh, stop!” Chanyeol whined, though he couldn’t help laughing at the same time. He was cringing so hard that he suddenly had a desperate urge to hide his face. “This is absolute torture.” 

Infuriatingly, Baekhyun just giggled at him. “It’s not, it’s so sweet! Let me finish… I promise it gets better.” Still grinning, he continued to read. “ _‘Everything about you is beautiful, lovely, sexy and wonderful. If I had been given the task of designing every detail of my dream partner, I could not have done a better job in a million years. I could never have chosen a more perfect combination of traits on my own, because I had no idea what kind of person I wanted most_ — _not until the person I wanted most walked right into my life and found me. I call this ‘the miracle of you’. You were not made for me to love, but for your own higher purpose, whatever that may be… but the best part is that I get to love you anyway, and be loved by you. I’ve never felt so lucky in all my life.’_ ”

When he’d finished reading, Baekhyun closed the book and put it down in his lap. “You know, that day we met for the second time… that was a complete coincidence. I definitely hadn’t planned to bump into you outside Lakuna, of all places. And I was crying because I was finally putting this hopeless quest for answers aside… letting go of all the control I thought I needed to get me through the desperate situation I was in. That was the precise moment you drove past me in your big pink van, chucked a Gaytime at my head and told me to cheer up. And I knew then that you _hadn’t_ changed, not really — you were still you, it was just the way you saw me that was different. You were still in my heart, and I thought if I was really lucky, a tiny part of me might still be in yours… now I think that maybe I was right.” Baekhyun grabbed Chanyeol’s hand again, holding it tight. “I’m sorry, I feel like I’ve just been yapping at you the whole night. You must be sick to death of me by now.”

Chanyeol shook his head. “I’m not,” he said quietly, “I’m really glad we talked.” 

Baekhyun chewed his lip, looking thoughtful again. “Why don’t we get out of here for a while?”

Chanyeol raised an eyebrow at him. He didn’t even want to know what time it was by then — whatever hour it was, it was surely an ungodly one — but strangely he wasn’t tired. “And go where, exactly?”

Baekhyun shrugged. “Dunno… just out for some air. Let’s go down to the beach.”

Chanyeol agreed, and so they walked around the point down to South Beach, without holding hands as they usually might, but still close enough to occasionally brush against each other. It was dark, but there was still just enough light coming from the street to see by. Baekhyun dropped down on the sand as soon as they got there, lying on his back, and Chanyeol lay down next to him, somewhat stiffly.

"You know, we came here at night and made out once,” Baekhyun said, laughing softly at the memory. He rolled on his side to face Chanyeol. “No, I’m pretty sure it was more than once. We also had sex up near the lighthouse — in the back of your car, no less.”

“Seriously?” Chanyeol laughed at that. “You horny little thing. I can’t say I’m surprised.”

“Seriously,” Baekhyun said, joining in on the laughter. “That was the first time you told me you loved me, incidentally. We stayed up to watch the sunrise together, and then we went back up to the car and made love in the back seat, even though by that time it was almost daylight. No one was around to see us, though; it was still really early in the morning. It was too squishy in there, and I kept bumping my head, and I think I accidentally elbowed you once or twice. But I’ll always remember that beautiful moment where you pressed your face against my stomach and started whispering _‘I love you’_ into it, over and over… such a lovely memory. I still think about that a lot.” Baekhyun let out a wistful little sigh, and when he opened his eyes again he smiled at Chanyeol, biting his lip. “We almost did it right here on the beach, too, but you weren't keen on getting sand in your pants, so we stopped.”

Chanyeol couldn’t help laughing again. “Wow. What other misadventures do I not know about?” He sighed and lay back against the sand, stretching his arms up above him. “I really wish I remembered all these things, Baek… you have no idea.”

Baekhyun reached over to hold his hand, squeezing it gently. “I want to kiss you, Sunny... like we did that night,” he said quietly. “And also that _other_ night, when I was drunk and horny and you rejected my advances.” He grinned. “Now there’s a night we can both remember.”

Chanyeol pouted in protest. “I didn’t _want_ to reject you… but you were really tipsy, and I was only trying to be decent. And car sex is a logistical nightmare when you’re as tall as I am. I’m surprised we ever managed to pull it off before.”

“There’s always a way when you both want it badly enough. Anyway, I’m only stirring you again, because you make it so easy for me… you always have.” Baekhyun squeezed Chanyeol’s hand again. “I always thought we were so in tune with each other, you know… it was one of those really special connections that you just know you’re not going to find more than once in your life. And after it ended, I remember making all these deals with the universe, or God, or whoever it was that might be listening to my prayers -- that I would try my hardest to be a better person, if it meant that one day you would remember me again. There was a lot of bargaining.”  He fell silent for a moment. “In the end, I think just the remote possibility of it was the thing that ruined me… that made it so hard to move on. I was always holding on to that one tiny thread of hope. But I’ve realised that hope can be a prison sometimes.” 

“You’re already a good person, Baek,” Chanyeol whispered. He took Baekhyun’s hand and kissed the back of it. “You’re the best person. You don’t need to be any better than you are.”

Baekhyun smiled at him. “You think so..?”

Chanyeol nodded. “I was so drawn to you the first time I saw you. Well, I mean the first time I saw you _again_. Maybe that was just my way of recognising you.” He brought Baekhyun’s hand to his lips and kissed the back of it one more time. “You know that I would do anything to remember you... to know you like you know me. I really wish I could.” 

Moving his hand away, Baekhyun sat upright and leaned forward to hug his knees. He let out a little sigh, barely heard over the sound of the waves, but otherwise he was quiet. The wind had suddenly turned cold, and Chanyeol sat up next to him, wrapping one arm around his shoulders to keep him warm. He was soon mesmerised by the ocean in front of them, watching the ripples of moonlight as they danced across the waves.

“Can we ever get over the hurt, I wonder,” he said quietly. “Or will we always be scarred by the fact that one of us remembers what happened before, and the other doesn’t?”

“I don’t know. Maybe it’s enough that one of us remembers,” Baekhyun whispered. “Maybe I don’t mind remembering for the two of us.” Now Chanyeol could see tears shining in his eyes; he looked like he might say something else, and even went as far as opening his mouth, but then he stopped.

"Just say it, Baek. You can say whatever you need to say."

"I really want to kiss you.” Baekhyun began leaning towards Chanyeol, and then he hesitated again. “Can I..?”

 _Since when do you ask to kiss me?_ Chanyeol thought. “Of course you can. You don’t need to ask.”

Baekhyun scooted over on the sand until they were sitting closer together. “Look at me… at my eyes.” He held Chanyeol’s face in both hands, lovingly circling each cheekbone with his thumbs, and then he leaned in and kissed him softly on the lips.

“I just want to remember,” Chanyeol said, whispering into the thread of space between their mouths. “Please help me remember.” He could tell Baekhyun was crying again from the heaving in his shoulders, which he was clearly trying to suppress. Some of his tears went into Chanyeol’s mouth while they kissed, the salt spreading over his tongue. What reparation could he possibly make for all this pain? There was nothing to do now but hold him, and carry him through his grief, knowing there would have been countless times when Baekhyun had carried him through his.

Baekhyun let out a small hiccup and then turned his head away, wiping his nose on one of his sleeves. “Sorry... I know I’m a fucking mess right now.”

 “Shhh. If you’re a mess, then I don’t even wanna know what I am.” Chanyeol gathered him in closer, holding him tight. “Maybe the old me fucked up, but the current me... he — _I_ wouldn’t hurt you like that again. I just couldn’t.” 

“But who are you?” Baekhyun turned his head, muffling his words against the side of Chanyeol’s neck. “Which of those people are you now?” 

Chanyeol wrapped his arms even tighter around Baekhyun’s shoulders and began rocking him gently, whispering into his hair to soothe him. “I’m your Sunny, the one who loves you more than anything. Even more than Sunnyboys and Gaytimes.” 

Baekhyun laughed, a beautiful and welcome sound that made Chanyeol’s heart swell with love. “Just hold me for a while,” he whispered. They lay down on the sand, close enough for their legs to tangle together, and Chanyeol kissed him to the sound of the ocean. He cradled Baekhyun against him for a while, and then laid him down and settled on top of him, sheltering that precious body with his own. _This_ could be his reparation, he thought, in some small way: holding him tight, keeping him warm and safe from the biting wind that had picked up since they got there. Here on the sand where there was nowhere to fall, nothing to hurt them. Even if the sky were to collapse on them right now, Chanyeol knew he wouldn’t let it touch Baekhyun; he would let it break him first. 

“Tell me who I am, then, beautiful boy,” he whispered, breathing the words like smoke into Baekhyun’s mouth, curling them around his tongue. It was wonderful just to kiss him like that, kissing purely for the sake of it, without it being a prelude to something else. He tried to kiss Baekhyun like he was kissing him for the first time again — relishing the feeling of those soft lips, and the palpable desire that shivered through his body whenever he was touched in a place he liked.

Baekhyun rested one hand on Chanyeol’s face, sliding it up into his hair and over the back of his head before drawing him in for an even deeper kiss. Every kiss was like the lighthouse kiss, Chanyeol thought; slow and sweet, maybe a bit shy, but there was still something that stole the breath from him every time. When he thought about that first kiss — the first kiss he actually remembered — it finally became clear to him just how much Baekhyun had already loved him back then. It was just that he hadn’t known how to see it, what signs to look for.

“You’re the best fucking kisser in the whole universe — that’s who you are.” With a shaky breath, Baekhyun pulled away for a moment, pressing his lips against the side of Chanyeol’s neck instead. “The best kisser ever… there’s something else that hasn’t changed.”

“I have sand in my mouth,” Chanyeol whispered. He felt the grit of it crunching between his teeth. He turned his head to one side to spit it out, and then he cupped Baekhyun’s chin in one hand to kiss him again, bolder and hungrier than before. _Do you ever think about how sand is just tiny rocks_ , he remembered Baekhyun saying to him once — but when? And was that from before or after? It felt like something Baekhyun had said to him in a dream. He wanted to clarify, but it seemed too inane a thing to ask about, and right now kissing him was far more important.

Baekhyun laughed softly. “Me too. I think I just got some of it from you.” He began to kiss along Chanyeol’s neck instead, and Chanyeol lay back with his eyes closed, enjoying the attention. He still felt something missing, though: there was a gaping chasm in him now, the desperate loss of all these things he had missed out on. And did he even have the right to feel that way? He hadn’t always known Baekhyun, wasn’t even conscious of that time they’d spent apart. Baekhyun was the one who had to live without him, the one who had to be alone — the one who had lost. And Chanyeol had once lost everything too, it seemed, but that time of his life was long forgotten, and was that a blessing or a curse?

“You told me something else that night, here on the beach… something I’ve never forgotten. You said if there was anything in this world that could save you, it was me,” Baekhyun said quietly. He was still nuzzling Chanyeol’s neck. “What I wouldn’t give to hear you say that again.”

“I don’t want you to feel like you have to save me from anything,” Chanyeol said. “That’s a terrible burden to place on another person.” He sighed, kissing the top of Baekhyun’s head. “You have no idea how sorry am. I just feel like there are so many things that I regret... and I don’t even remember doing them, which is the really frustrating part. I can never truly know what it is I’ve done. All I can do is see all the pain I’ve caused you.”

“I love you,” Baekhyun said quietly. “I love this version of you… I do. But I can’t stop loving the old Chanyeol, either.”

“I can’t even imagine not wanting to be with you,” Chanyeol whispered. Baekhyun’s head was on his chest again, up near his shoulder; he kissed it, breathing in the smell of him and murmuring softly into his hair. “Tell me some more of your favourite memories, babe.”

“Of you..?” 

“Of me. Of us. Whatever you like.”

Baekhyun looked thoughtful. “I think in some ways, you were slightly goofier before it happened,” he said. “You've lost some of the goof. And you had this terrible habit of walking past me while I was asleep on the couch, and dropping your dirty undies on my face.” He grinned at the memory. “I can’t believe I’m actually saying this… but I think I might actually miss it.”

Chanyeol laughed. “Well, if you really like that sort of thing, I suppose we could always bring it back.”

“Mmm… I dunno.” Now Baekhyun was laughing too, and Chanyeol felt his body flood with warmth at the sound of it. “Maybe we should give that one a bit more thought.”

“We should make another new memory tonight. Like the one we made at the lighthouse,” Chanyeol whispered, looking up at the stars above them. “Am I still the person you fell for, or does it feel like you’re with someone else?”

Baekhyun was quiet again for a long time. “I can feel him in there,” he said. “But something about you is different. Not necessarily in a good or a bad way… it’s just different.”

“He _is_ me,” Chanyeol said. “We’re the same person.” 

“I know that now. But I had to come back here to be sure of it,” Baekhyun said. “And eventually I realised that you’re far more than just your memories, anyway. Not being able to remember me anymore doesn’t mean you’re no longer yourself. You’re still my Sunny… still the person I fell in love with. And the way you look at me hasn’t changed.” He closed his eyes, leaning his head against Chanyeol’s shoulder. “You don’t know how good it felt to finally see you looking at me like that again... the way you used to look at me.”

“I hate knowing that I hurt you like that. If I could take the pain away from you right now, then I would,” Chanyeol said, whispering into his hair.

“Look at me, though… look at all the things I hid from you for so long.” Baekhyun let out a shuddering breath, burying his face in the crook of Chanyeol’s neck. Chanyeol could tell he was trying to hide his tears again. “I did it because I wanted you back... I wanted things to be the way they were before. But that doesn’t make it right." 

“Do you know what I want most of all?” Chanyeol whispered.

Baekhyun moved his head away from Chanyeol’s neck, leaning back so he could look at him. “What?” he asked, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand.

With an arm around his shoulders, Chanyeol pulled Baekhyun closer, pressing a soft kiss against his forehead. “I want to go on long drives for no reason, other than just needing to get away,” he said. “I want to spend entire evenings making out with you in my car, and entire mornings making love when we get home. I want to share so many things with you: beautiful memories, and adventure, and _misadventure_ , and intimacy — the deepest intimacy it’s humanly possible to have with another person. I want to _really_ know you, like I used to know you. Because I’ve read some of those things I wrote about you, and there’s no way I could’ve written them about someone I didn’t know and love with all my heart." 

“I really want all of that too. And maybe it’s gonna take some time for us to get there again… but I think that’s okay.” Chanyeol could feel the smile on Baekhyun’s lips when they kissed again. “I’m much more patient these days, anyway.”

 

At some point they must have fallen asleep on the sand with their arms around each other, because the next time Chanyeol opened his eyes, he saw the sky beginning to lighten above them. He had a feeling of deja vu, and wondered how many times Baekhyun had lived through moments just like this one. Sitting up, he watched Baekhyun sleep for a minute longer, and then gently stroked his cheek with one finger. “Wake up, sleepyhead… it’s nearly morning.”

Baekhyun stirred at the sound of his voice, blinking up at him. “Mmm. What time is it..?” 

“No idea… still pretty early. But the sun’ll rise soon.” Chanyeol moved Baekhyun’s fringe aside, bending down to kiss him on the forehead. “Should we stay here on the beach and watch it?”

Baekhyun considered this for a moment, and then he slowly got to his feet, dusting the sand off his clothes. There was a twinkle of mischief in his eyes as he pulled Chanyeol away from the beach, leading him back up in the direction of the lighthouse. “I have an idea for a new memory we can make right now,” he said. “It’s a bit on the naughty side, but I think you’ll like it.”

 

At Baekhyun’s suggestion, they sneaked behind the lighthouse, carrying the picnic blanket Chanyeol kept in the boot of his car. They spread the blanket out on the grassy hill facing the ocean, and made love there with the sun rising above them. (“We’re not young and bendy enough for car sex anymore,” Baekhyun said, and though he was only joking, Chanyeol couldn’t really argue with him.) How incredible it was to be surrounded by the sea and sky, with the gentlest ocean breeze caressing their bodies. Being out in the open didn’t put Chanyeol off at all, as he thought it might; it only turned him on even more, and he could tell that Baekhyun was excited by it too. How could he ever forget how gorgeous Baekhyun was in that moment, laid out on the old tartan blanket with his skin glowing gold from the new sun, the dawning sky reflected in his eyes. Chanyeol loved the taste of the salt wind on his skin when he kissed him, and the way he whispered _“Sunny, please,”_ whenever he paused in any one place for too long. There were too many places on Baekhyun’s body that he wanted to kiss, that was the problem — but as far as problems went, it was a good problem to have.

 “Please don’t ever try to relive this memory with anyone else,” Chanyeol whispered — partly joking, but mostly serious — and the sigh of pleasure that left Baekhyun’s mouth quickly turned into breathless laughter.

“Don’t worry,” he replied, “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

With a smile still on his lips, Chanyeol resumed kissing Baekhyun all over, whispering _“my beautiful boy”_ into the softness of his skin — spurred on by the feeling of his lover’s fingers tugging at his hair, the encouraging murmurs of _“mmm, right there”_ and _“feels so good”_. Maybe history was beginning to repeat itself again, but he knew things didn’t have to turn out the same as before; they could do so much better now that they had the benefit of hindsight, the miracle of a second chance.

 

After they’d dressed themselves again, they stayed on the blanket a little while longer to look out at the sea, kissing and cuddling whenever the fancy took them. When they’d been comfortably quiet for some time, Chanyeol grabbed one of Baekhyun’s hands and kissed the back of it. “Baek, can I say something?”

Baekhyun yawned and stretched himself out on the blanket, looking cute as a sleepy kitten. His hair was still messy from where Chanyeol had run his hands through it before. “Of course you can, babe.” 

Now that the spotlight was on him, Chanyeol felt a flutter of nerves. “I dunno if this is a crazy thing to do… but we did just have sex behind a lighthouse, so maybe it’s not that crazy.” Smiling, he leaned over to press a soft, chaste kiss upon Baekhyun’s lips. “I want to spend the rest of my life with you,” he said, and Baekhyun quickly pulled him back in for another kiss, whispering “ _yes_ , Sunny… fuck yes,” into his mouth. He held on so tightly that Chanyeol could barely breathe, but at that moment, he didn’t really care too much about breathing. His heart felt like it was bursting out of his chest with happiness.

 

“I think I need some time away,” Baekhyun said a little later, while they were walking back to the car; they would probably both be late for work again, but Chanyeol was in such a good mood that he didn’t care. “I haven’t been home in ages, and it’d be good for you to have some space as well.”

Chanyeol pouted, reaching over to hold both of Baekhyun’s hands. “I only just asked you to marry me like five seconds ago, and you’re already trying to get away from me..?”

“ _No_ , you idiot!” Baekhyun said, laughing at him. “I just think I should go visit the oldies, that’s all… maybe stay with them for a little while. A few days to a week, tops. I’ve been meaning to see them anyway, they’re probably starting to forget what I look like.”

“Ah. Well, if that's what you want, then you should do it.” Chanyeol grabbed one of Baekhyun’s hands again and kissed it. “But you'll definitely come back this time, right?”

Baekhyun chuckled softly. He pulled his helmet out of the topbox and put it on his head, then hopped up on the back of Buzz and started the engine. "Yes, of course… for you, I’ll always come back. Anyway, fondness makes the heart grow distant, or however that bloody saying goes." He winked at Chanyeol before pulling the visor of his helmet down. “Last one home’s a rotten egg!”

Chanyeol watched Baekhyun blow a kiss at him before he rode off ahead, and then he walked back to his car. He drove behind and beeped Minty’s horn at him all the way back to the main road, laughing when Baekhyun playfully flipped him off as he rode by.

 

*****

 

 

Baekhyun organised to take the following week off from work, and went down to his parents’ place on the Sunday afternoon. He would return again the following weekend. Chanyeol didn’t ask to accompany him; he wanted Baekhyun to have some much needed time with his family, and though he hadn’t met them yet, he figured that there would be plenty of time for that later. It didn’t mean he wouldn’t miss Baekhyun terribly, though, because they’d barely spent more than a few days apart since they moved in together. On the same morning he left to go home, Minseok came to pick Chanyeol up at his place, and then they drove to the cemetery together to visit Kris. His grave looked like it had been tended to recently, which was comforting, and there was a cool breeze stirring the flowers that had been laid out in front of the headstone. Inlaid into the granite was a photograph of Kris within an oval frame, smiling and handsome, his blonde hair falling over his forehead.

“Have you had much contact with his parents?” Chanyeol asked, while they stood there side by side, looking down at the grave. “Do you reckon they hate me?”

Minseok shook his head. “I haven’t really seen them in years… probably not since the funeral. But I’m positive that they don’t hate you. No one blames you, you know — it’s certainly not your fault that he fell. It was just something terrible and shitty that happened.”

Chanyeol nodded, but he felt a little too choked up to say anything, and he was grateful when he felt Minseok put a comforting hand on his shoulder.

“I didn’t think telling you how he died was a good idea for this exact reason,” Minseok said, and then he sighed. “Now you’re just gonna feel responsible again.”

“No, you’re right… it won’t do me any good to keep feeling guilty about it,” Chanyeol said quietly. “Sure as hell won’t bring him back.”

Minseok nodded. “Fuckin’ oath, it won’t… it’ll just make you miserable. And life’s too short for that.”

“Do you think _he_ hates me, then?” Chanyeol asked. “For trying to… well, erase him.”

Minseok paused for a moment, which Chanyeol took as a worrying sign, but then maybe he was just thinking. “No... I really don’t think Kris hates you. He always thought the world of you,” he said. “I’m not sure if you know about this... I doubt it, anyway… but I think he was the first one to twig that you were gay — you know, before you came out officially. Apart from me, of course, but then it takes one to know one.” He laughed heartily at his own joke, and Chanyeol couldn’t help chuckling too. “Anyway, I remember one Saturday after we won a game against Smiths Hill, we were both standing together in the change room and he was talking to me about you: saying something about how if anyone ever gave you shit for liking guys, then he was going to fuck them up, regardless of the consequences. Even if it got him kicked out of school. And you know he hated getting into fights, it just wasn’t his thing… but in a school like ours, with all those really rough kids, I could tell he was worried about you. I don’t think he ever worried about anyone else in that way. ‘What a lovely soft-hearted thing he is, what if someone hurts him?’ He was always saying stuff like that. He was a lot like Baekhyun in that respect, because Baekhyun used to always worry about you, too… probably still does, the little worry-wart.”

Minseok looked down at the grave in thoughtful silence for a moment before he continued. “I know it seems like you were always trying to keep Kris in line at parties and stuff, Yeol, but there was never a time that he wasn’t also looking out for you. And you saving yourself that day isn’t something to feel ashamed or guilty about, because you _tried_ to save him. He knows that you tried. I’ll bet he’s really thankful for it, too.”

When he was finished speaking, Minseok kneeled down on the grass, plucking out a few dandelions and other weeds growing around the perimeter of the grave, and then he stood up again, wiping his hands on his jeans. “Anyway, he’s not here anymore, so don’t worry about what he thinks. Wherever he is, he’s probably having a much better time than we are. Shooting hoops up in the clouds and shit.” 

Chanyeol smiled. “I’m sure he is.”

 

They drove down to the beach afterwards and had burgers for lunch while sitting on the edge of the promenade, looking out at the ocean. While they were eating, Minseok pulled the beetroot out of his burger and chucked it onto the sand.

“What the hell, man... that’s the best part,” Chanyeol said, pretending to be affronted by the act.

Minseok just shrugged, sucking tomato sauce off the end of his thumb. “Meh. Not a fan.”

Chanyeol took another bite out of his burger, the juice of it dripping down his chin. He wiped it away with the back of his hand. “Thanks for accompanying me today, by the way. It means a lot.”

“You’re alright. It was the least I could do,” Minseok said. “How’s Baek going?”

“Good,” Chanyeol said. “Except that I miss the absolute shit out of him.”

Minseok rolled his eyes. “He’s only been gone a few hours!”

“This is all your fault,” Chanyeol said jokingly. “ _You’re_ the one who set us up again in the first place, so it’s only fair that I blame you for my predicament. I was perfectly fine on my own before. Just me and my trusty right hand.”

“Mate, TMI.” Minseok shook his head, laughing at Chanyeol, and then he picked up the last few chips that had gone soggy, tossing them away for the seagulls to fight to the death over. “Remember how Sehun and I were banging on about meeting him for ages, just so we could stop pretending that we didn’t already know him? Good times.”

“Yeah, I know… you’re both shitheads, what else is new,” Chanyeol said, partly under his breath, but he was full of gratitude, and he knew that Minseok knew it too. He crumpled the paper bag from his burger up into a greasy ball, squeezing it in his hand. “Do you remember the day I met him? The first time, I mean… he said it happened at the bike shop.”

"Do I remember… how could I bloody forget?” Minseok said, and then he smiled sheepishly when Chanyeol shot him a wounded look. “Oh yeah... sorry. Anyway, you came to visit me at work one day, and he came in wanting to look at the scooters, and I saw your jaw just drop to the floor immediately. You took one look at him, and then you walked over to talk to him, and somehow convinced him to buy that red Aprilia he still rides around — mind you, you know fuck all about motorbikes and scooters, but you were such a charmer that it worked on him. You didn't even work there, for fuck's sake, but you made the quickest sale I've ever seen! And then you scored a date with him that weekend, as well. After that, there was no looking back — you were smitten, and so was he. I honestly thought you two would last forever… and then I thought I was wrong.” He shrugged. “But now, who knows? Maybe you’ll both prove me right after all."

 

Chanyeol went to bed early that night, and reread his old journal from cover to cover — something he’d been planning to do when he was alone anyway. It seemed the best way — perhaps the only way — to get to know his former self; or _their_ former selves, because he was reading about the old Baekhyun too. It felt strange to think of him as the ‘old’ Baekhyun, really, when they’d been together only a couple of years ago. From the way Chanyeol had written about him, he seemed like much the same person as he was now. 

While he read, Chanyeol wondered if he should begin writing again; if he should document their love as before, just in case. Really, who knew what might happen? He often had the urge to sketch these days, but he never really wrote anything at all, much less about Baekhyun; whenever he thought about Baekhyun, his feelings seemed inarticulable. He couldn’t reduce them to mere words, because to do so would be oversimplifying things.

Maybe he felt more intensely, or more abstractly, about Baekhyun now than he had before; and maybe this was because he knew he had been with him already. But when he read through the things he’d written previously, they already seemed intense enough on their own: tender and quiet little observations of a bittersweet, sadly short-lived first love. His words embodied Baekhyun, brought him to life: they were often joyful, sometimes sensual and occasionally devastating, just like Baekhyun himself.

 

Baekhyun texted Chanyeol every day while he was gone, but he never called. Chanyeol desperately wanted to hear his voice again, but he didn’t want to intrude on Baekhyun’s time with his family, so he didn’t call either; at least until the Saturday night before Baekhyun was due to come home, when he finally caved in.

 

“I’m sorry for calling, but I miss the absolute shit out of you,” he said as soon as Baekhyun answered the phone, without even giving him the chance to say hello.

Baekhyun just laughed. “Don’t be sorry,” he said, “I’m happy you called. It’s only been a week, though, babe. Why do you miss me?”

Chanyeol flopped down on the bed, curling up in the foetal position, and hugged Baekhyun’s pillow against his chest. He buried his face in it, breathing in whatever traces of Baekhyun’s scent he could find. “What do you mean, ‘why’ — why _wouldn’t_ I miss you?”

“Aww, Sunny… but you know I’ll be home soon. My parents keep asking when I’m gonna bring you home so they can meet you, by the way,” Baekhyun said. “And please don’t hate me, but I _may_ have accidentally spilled the beans to them about the proposal. But if it makes you feel better, they were very happy and excited for us.”

“Oh, you naughty thing — I haven't even looked at any bloody rings yet! And I wanted to ask them for their blessing, too.” Chanyeol sighed. “Alright, I guess the cat’s out of the bag now… just tell them we’ll come down and visit whenever they want. Anyway, I know I’m probably being a sook about missing you... but I’ve never really been without you until now, and I’ve decided that I don’t like it very much.”

“Ah. Well, now you know how _I_ felt, I suppose,” Baekhyun said airily. “Having to be without you for all that time…" 

“Don’t be unfair,” Chanyeol whined, “I didn’t realise what I was doing.”

 “I know, I know. I’m just being a dick.” Chanyeol could hear the smile in Baekhyun’s voice. “It’s not too soon to make jokes about the whole thing, is it?” 

“I guess not,” Chanyeol said. Now he was smiling too. “You’re still coming home tomorrow, right?” 

“Yes, of course... I promise. I need to be back at work on Monday, anyway. Will you take the van out as usual?”

“Probably not. There’s the street festival in Port Kembla tomorrow, and because it’s a council-run event I promised Chaerin I’d go and help out. But I thought maybe if I get a chance, I might take the van down there at some point during the day. The weather should be good… might as well take advantage of the crowd.”

“Smart cookie. I’m sure you’ll absolutely smash it.” Baekhyun yawned, and Chanyeol immediately felt a pang of longing when he heard it. “I’d better go to sleep now, I’m dead on my feet. But I’ll see you tomorrow, okay? I’ll probably be back sometime in the arvo. And the first thing I’m gonna do is snuggle you senseless.”

“Okay,” Chanyeol whispered, making a loud smooching sound into the phone. “Can’t wait to get you naked, you sexy thing.”

Baekhyun laughed softly, and then he made his own kissing noises, returning the favour. “Not if I get you naked first,” he said, and finished up with one last very loud, very wet-sounding kiss, right in Chanyeol’s ear. “Love you, cutie. Don’t miss me too much!”

“Love you too, beautiful boy.” Chanyeol ended the call and sighed, falling back in a sad heap upon the bed. How was he ever going to sleep now? Their apartment had felt so empty all week, and of course the bed felt even emptier. A bed was not a bed without Baekhyun. A home was not a home without him, either. Chanyeol couldn’t wait for him to be home again; to cook him dinner and eat it with him, and talk all about his time away. And afterwards, maybe they could kiss and cuddle on the sofa for a while, and then go to bed, make love, kiss a bit more, maybe make love again, and then — only then — fall asleep in each other’s arms. It sounded just like any other night in together, and therefore shouldn’t have been much to get excited about; but Chanyeol hadn’t seen or touched Baekhyun in six whole days, and he felt so deprived of his love that he nearly ached from the loss of it. When he eventually did fall asleep that night, it was only because he was still hugging Baekhyun’s pillow.

 

 

*****

 

The street festival went well, at least, and Chanyeol was so busy that he almost forgot to be excited about Baekhyun coming home that day. At Chaerin’s delegation, he was put on barbecue duty, standing over a hot grill and cooking sausages and burgers with a group of other council volunteers, serving them up to a long line of hungry festival-goers. They’d closed off the street to have a go-kart race, and there were market stalls, and kids walking around with their faces painted like Elsa and Spiderman and Jack Sparrow. Chanyeol smiled at them; he thought about those days when Baekhyun would help him out in the van, and how good he was with the kids, and then he missed him all over again. He couldn’t wait for Baekhyun to come back home. He looked down at his watch — only another couple of hours, probably. He was meant to be coming back sometime that afternoon, but Chanyeol wasn’t sure of the exact time he planned to arrive. 

Eventually he was relieved of his duties, and then he hurried over to his parents’ house to pick up the van, driving it back to the festival to make the most of the crowd. He made a killing that day; not as much as he’d made on some of his days with Baekhyun, but certainly the most money he’d ever made on his own. He wished Baekhyun could have been there too, to be the perfect salesman that he was. It wasn’t anywhere near as fun being alone as it was having Baekhyun with him, but at least there was no competition — to his delight, Jongdae was nowhere to be seen.

 

When he went back to his parents’ place to drop the van off, his mother made him stay for an early dinner — or a late lunch — setting a huge bowl of bibimbap in the middle of the table. They shared the bowl, taking turns to dig large spoonfuls out of it.

“This is really good,” Chanyeol said. He was a bit too enthusiastic to blow on the rice properly, and burned his mouth on the first spoonful, but the pain was worth it.

Mrs. Park shrugged. “I just threw together whatever I had in the fridge.” She said this about most of the things she cooked. “Where’s Baekhyunnie today? You should call him and tell him to come over.”

Chanyeol shook his head. “He’s been at his parent’s place for the past week, but he’s meant to be coming back this arvo. If he was home already then he would’ve called me by now.”

“You just want all the bibimbap for yourself,” his mother teased, and Chanyeol grinned through a mouthful of rice, because he couldn’t exactly argue with her. 

“It’s alright,” Mrs. Park said, “I have some nice things for you to take home with you. He can eat when he gets back.”

Chanyeol picked at a couple of bean sprouts with his chopsticks. “You knew all along, didn’t you?” he said quietly. “That we were together before.” 

His mother froze for a moment, looking down at the bowl in front of her. Finally her eyes flickered up to look at him, and she pursed her lips. “Yes, darling,” she said, “I knew.”

Chanyeol’s expression softened. “Why didn’t you tell me..?”

Mrs. Park let out a long exhale, still looking down at the bibimbap. When she met Chanyeol’s gaze again, she said, “well, because it was a difficult time, and you had suffered enough. And your dad and I really liked Baekhyun... we liked him a lot — we still do. We could tell that he was good for you. But after it all went sour, he wanted to move on with his life, and he wanted you to do the same. You had no idea who he was, and he was distraught about it, and he needed some time away to figure things out. And who were we to stop him, if that was what he wanted?” She shrugged, and dug out another spoonful of rice, beef and vegetables, blowing on it before taking a bite. “So he asked us never to mention him to you again, and as sad as we were, we agreed. And then he went from a regular and well-loved appearance in our home to someone we no longer knew,” — she snapped her fingers — “just like that.” 

Chanyeol put his spoon down on the table, suddenly losing his appetite a little. “Damn,” he said quietly. “That’s really sad.”

Mrs. Park nodded. “When he came into your life again, at first your father and I were… surprised, I suppose, and maybe a little wary. But we remembered how much you loved each other at the time, and how well-suited you seemed to be, and we thought, well, maybe now, under different and perhaps better circumstances… it might be good for the two of you to give it another try.” She smiled, reaching over to gently stroke one side of Chanyeol’s face. “And we’re both very happy that you’re happy. Just be sure to treat him well, okay? Trust me when I say that he’s definitely earned it.”

Chanyeol looked at her for a long time, pressing his lips together in a bid to hold it in, and then he sighed and thought, _fuck it_. “I asked him to marry me, and he said yes,” he said, and the look on her face when she got up from her chair and pulled him into one of her suffocating hugs was priceless -- so priceless, in fact, that he could have framed it and hung it up on the wall at home.

 

*****

 

By the time Chanyeol got back from his parents’ place, it was already early evening, and there was no one around. He walked through the empty apartment, checking all the rooms. Baekhyun wasn’t there. He felt the disappointment sitting heavy in his stomach. He _should_ have come back already… but perhaps he was stuck in traffic. The traffic did tend to be pretty bad coming back in to Wollongong from the South — particularly on Sundays, when people returned home from their weekends away. 

He waited until the sun went down, and then he tried calling Baekhyun’s mobile. There was no answer; instead the call went straight to voicemail. Chanyeol guessed that this wasn’t cause for too much concern. Baekhyun was probably still on his way home, and unable to answer the phone. He waited another half an hour, and then he tried calling another time. Once again, straight to voicemail.

Now he _was_ beginning to feel nervous. Was it too early to panic? He didn’t know what to do.

At some point he must have conked out on the sofa, exhausted from not sleeping well the night before, and he woke up suddenly to the sound of his phone ringing. When he checked the time, he was shocked to see that it was nearly 11 PM. Picking up the phone, his heart skipped a beat when he saw Baekhyun’s name on the screen, and he quickly answered it. “Baek? Fucking hell, where _are_ you? I’ve been worried sick!”

“Hello,” said the voice on the other end — a quiet and hesitant voice. She was also a woman, and sounded older, and was therefore not Baekhyun at all. “Am I speaking to Chanyeol?” she asked. She pronounced his name perfectly. _Must be Korean_ , Chanyeol thought, still a little bewildered, and then the penny dropped. 

“Um, yes, it’s Chanyeol. Who am I speaking to..?” he asked, and he closed his eyes, preparing himself for the answer. He sat down on the floor. He already felt lightheaded, and he didn’t know why. He couldn’t breathe, and he didn’t know why.

Baekhyun’s mother was calling him, from Baekhyun’s phone, and she didn’t sound happy — and he didn’t know why. He didn’t _want_ to know why.

He waited for her to speak, and then she said the words that would have surely brought him to his knees, if he hadn’t already been sitting down. He could only retain each sentence in fragments. _He’s had an accident. Came off his scooter on his way home. In the ICU at Shoalhaven hospital. Very badly hurt. I’m so sorry. I thought you should know._ It was like someone had suddenly come up behind him and kicked in the backs of both legs, and then punched him in the stomach as well, and he crumpled before he could even fully comprehend it, gasping from having the air crushed out of his lungs. He curled up with the phone clenched in his hand, and stayed there on the floor for a long time, long after the call ended, where he knew on some level that he _should_ be safe — at least bodily. He couldn’t fall any further than that. But there was something else he knew, too, something not spoken but rather felt, a feeling resurfacing from a forgotten time; _there is still so much lower you can go,_ it told him, _so much lower, even with the floor there beneath you._

 

________________________________

 

_May 23rd_

_‘Life is what happens to you when you’re busy making other plans’ -- this is something John Lennon says in his lovely song, ‘Beautiful Boy’. I think about that a lot, these days... about how absolutely right he was. Sometimes he’s so right that it hurts._

 

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Playlist for Chapter 9:
> 
> 1\. [Fool’s Errand - Fleet Foxes](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5hMBxYqq5c)  
> 2\. [Roving Jewel (Acoustic) - The Coral](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXZNfuM_Ljs)  
> 3\. [Mistake - Middle Kids](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRmsyFCP-Jw)  
> 4\. [Knees - Ocean Alley](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-m5RTM8d6A)  
> 5\. [I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues - Elton John](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6KYAVn8ons)  
> 6\. [Pick You Up - Powderfinger](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8opqqUsIF7o)  
> 7\. [I Will Follow You Into The Dark - Death Cab for Cutie](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FhRQt1vm3A)


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